Diamond Dusk
by purplemew12
Summary: Originally a Nuzlocke of Pokemon Diamond, this is the story of Ceres, who I suppose you could call a Pokemon trainer. I'm afraid saying any more might spoil the story.
1. Prologue

Prologue

She walked slowly along the side of the lake, taking steps so even that it seemed each one was carefully planned. Her arms hung loosely at her sides, but did not sway in the slightest as she walked. She looked straight ahead as she walked, her hazel eyes focused on a sole figure standing by the lakeside, staring out at something that was not yet there.

The air was fresh and clean. Something that, a lifetime ago, she would have noticed, and rejoiced in. She was no longer who she had been however, and she didn't seem to notice the air quality. Her attention remained focused on the sole figure.

Starly swooped through the air in intricate patterns. Goldeen leapt gracefully from the lake, landing so perfectly that it almost seemed rehearsed. A few Magikarp tried to imitate their more elegant fish counterparts, and failed miserably, splashing water everywhere, and thoroughly disturbing the rest of the Pokemon.

She noticed none of them.

She stopped a few feet from the figure she had been watching so intently. He was a man with pale blue hair, and distant eyes, and he seemed to be paying as little attention to her as she had to the local wildlife. Nonetheless, she stood up a bit straighter, and tucked her hands tightly behind her back, her gaze never wavering in the slightest.

For a while, they were both entirely silent, and the sounds of nature surrounding them.

Then, he spoke. "Ceres," he said indifferently, still looking out at the lake.

"Cyrus," she replied, softly, but clearly.

The wild Pokemon had fallen entirely silent as these two names were spoken.

The man turned to look at her, and held out a single object.

She accepted it silently, and he gave her a curt nod of dismissal. She turned on her heel and walked away, taking the same precise steps as before, her face a mask of indifference, her arms returning to their usual position at her sides.

Cyrus watched her leave, and then turned his attention back to the lake, muttering a single word: "Mesprit."

He waited a while, staring out at what was not yet there. Then, he called of a single order, and with a swish of purple wings, he was gone.

The wild Pokemon slowly began to speak again, their conversations all about the two strange humans, and their near silent exchange at the lakeside. None of them could guess their true purpose there, none of them had heard Cyrus' muttered promise, and none of them knew that his plans had only now, truly commenced.


	2. Chapter 1: Shelly

Chapter 1: Shelly

When she was far enough from the lakefront, Ceres' walk slowed evenly to a stop. She leaned against the rough trunk of a tall pine, and inspected the small object that Cyrus had given her.

It was divided evenly in half by a black line. The top of the object was red, the bottom white, and it the very center of one side was a tiny button. Pressing the button enlarged the object.

Ceres had recognized the object as soon as she had seen it. It was a pokeball.

"Go," she said dully, holding the pokeball out in front of her.

The pokeball opened suddenly with a soft click, and released a beam of white light, that started to take the shape of a Pokemon. Ceres watched as the Pokemon formed, and the pokeball clicked shut. Slowly the white light started to fade, leaving behind a small, light blue bird, with tiny yellow feet, and darker blue feathers on its head. It had intelligent blue eyes, and blinked at her once before chirping out a greeting.

She stared at the Piplup for a while. It chirped something else.

"I'll call you Shelly," she stated suddenly, and then she began to walk away.

The Piplup now known as Shelly stared after her uncomprehendingly. She began to follow the human, but couldn't keep up with her strange, even, and oddly quick steps. In a last ditch effort to catch up with the human who had so quickly and decisively named her, and whom she supposed was now her trainer, Shelly dashed ahead faster than her tiny yellow feet had ever carried her before. Suddenly, she tripped and fell, skidding to a stop in some very tall grass.

She stood up, and looked around for her new trainer. She saw nothing but a forest of green, tall grass in every direction.

The little Piplup began to panic, having lost sight of her trainer, as the grass was well over her head, and she could see nothing beyond it. She looked around feverishly, still seeing nothing but green wherever she looked.

She began hopping, trying to see over the tops of the grass blades, perhaps to spot her trainer nearby, but just she couldn't hop high enough. She hopped again, as high as she could, and saw a bit of gray, a bit of the sky. Encouraged by this little scrap of the outside world, she tried again.

Suddenly, something barreled into her, mid-hop, and she tumbled sideways, landing gracelessly on her head. Carefully getting to her feet, the Piplup looked around for her attacker, her eyes falling on a very angry looking Bidoof.

He chattered at her, using some very rude words that she vowed _she'd _never use, and ran at her again. She panicked, not knowing why he was so angry with her, and, in a last-ditch attempt to stop his attack, let out what she hoped was a threatening growl. A strangled squawk emerged from her beak instead as the Bidoof rammed her belly, sending her tumbling again.

The Bidoof walked towards her again, about to use another Tackle. She screeched as loud as she could. For a moment, the Bidoof seemed startled. Then, as nothing happened, he smirked maliciously, and began to ready his Tackle attack again.

Then he was scooped up by the scruff of his neck, and flung into a nearby pine tree, hitting it with a rather satisfying 'thump' and slumping to the ground, obviously unconscious.

Shelly looked up to see her trainer looking down at her, and chirped happy thanks.

"Keep up," was all that the human said to her, and then she began walking off again, although noticeably more slowly this time.

Shelly had no trouble keeping up with her now, and soon, they were out of the patches of too-tall grass, and into the next town.

It was small, but not too small, with a few houses scattered here, a few scattered there, buildings with roofs of red and blue, and a large, official-looking building with a sign that the Piplup couldn't read, but that her trainer obviously could.

"So this is Professor Rowan's lab," she muttered to no one in particular.

"Are you interested in Pokemon Research?" a new voice asked from behind them.

Ceres froze entirely, not even daring to breathe. It was very early in the morning. She had meant to come and go unseen. Unfortunately, there was now no chance of that.

Finally, she turned to face the speaker, a boy with black hair, a red scarf, warm-looking clothes, and a beret.

"I'm Lucas," the boy said, holding out his hand, expecting a handshake.

Ceres merely stared at him blankly for a very long time, until finally Lucas' hand fell back to his side, and he stared questioningly at the odd girl wearing a rather strange outfit, who obviously didn't know how to shake hands.

"You don't need to know my name," she stated finally, stealing a final glance at the lab before beginning to walk away, Shelly following closely on her tail.

"W-Wait!" Lucas called, not about to let the odd girl escape without telling him something, "What brings you to Sandgem Town? I've never seen you around here before."

"I need to buy pokeballs," she stated blandly, heading for the blue-roofed building, which she recognized as a PokeMart.

Lucas tried to walk at the same pace as the girl, but had to keep speeding up or slowing down to match each of her equal steps.

Ceres opened the PokeMart doors, and walked inside, thankful that the shop was open despite the early hour.

She walked over, and found a bin where they kept a large supply of pokeballs. Continuing to ignore Lucas, she picked up a tiny black pouch that she supposed would hold up to six minimized pokeballs, picked up five of said pokeballs, and went to the counter to pay for them.

"That'll be fifteen dollars," said the cashier, a very bored, and tired looking woman in a standard PokeMart uniform.

She had absolutely no intention of paying the woman, for if she was correct…

"Um…let me pay for this stuff, okay?" Lucas asked, handing the cashier the money without waiting for an answer.

And she was. Ceres was often aware of the intentions of others, for reasons that she could not remember, nor comprehend.

As they walked out of the PokeMart the boy continued to chatter incessantly about every little thing, and Ceres mostly tuned him out. That is, until she heard something that caught her attention.

"Professor Rowan's got some kind of 'evolutionary notes' to bring to a researcher in Jubilife City. I don't really get it but he says its important that my Chimchar, Blaze and I-" She rolled her eyes at the common nickname, "-escort him. Sheesh, he acts like somebody wants to steal his notes or something, I don't know." She smiled slightly, and Lucas took that as her agreeing with him about the strangeness of the very thought. He continued, "So if you'd…like to come along. We're going in a couple of days."

"Of course," she said, although she really had no desire to spend any more time around Lucas, "I'll meet you near the lab then. Two days."

"Great! I-I mean…sure! That's just fine!" Lucas grinned.

"Lucas!" a gruff voice called from the Pokemon Lab Ceres had, at first, been looking for.

"C-Coming Professor!" Lucas called back, "Sorry, got to go, see you then, bye!" he said, running off immediately afterwards.

Shelly watched the boy run off, and gave her trainer a confused look, followed by a question about her motives. She received no answer, and began to wonder if her trainer did not understand her in the slightest. Of course she did not expect her to understand every word she said, as trainers were humans after all, but she'd always been told that most trainers had _some _sense of what their Pokemon were saying.

Ceres, oblivious to her Pokemon's thoughts and worries, minimized Shelly's pokeball, and put it into the little black bag with the others. Then she began to walk, careful to stay at the pace that Shelly could keep up with.

They walked past a few buildings, and Shelly began to wonder about Ceres' destination. She didn't ask about it however, as she was sure her question would be either entirely ignored, or simply not understood.

After they had been walking for a while, the soft grass underfoot was replaced by cool sand, and, never having truly seen sand before, Shelly hopped in happy circles, kicking the wonderful grains around. That is, until she noticed the disapproving glare Ceres was giving her, and stopped immediately, avoiding her trainer's gaze, and almost shrinking into herself with sudden shame.

Ceres' glare faded, to be replaced by her usual uncaring stare. She began to walk again, stopping a few feet away from a large body of very cold water, staring out at the waves.

Shelly ran to catch up with her, terrified of being left behind again, and, not expecting her trainer to stop, ended up clumsily running right past her. When she attempted to stop, she slipped on the sand, and fell with a splash into the icy water.

Although it wasn't very deep water that she fell onto, she panicked, and struggled to get away from the sudden cold. The water soaked mercilessly into her soft, fluffy baby feathers, dragging her down further. She didn't realize that she was pushing herself further away from the shore, or how quickly she was doing so, until suddenly, there was no more land below her tiny feet.

The energy of a wave caught her, and tossed her above the water for a moment, before gravity plunged her down again. Everything was gray and blue and cold.

Ceres considered leaving the Piplup there to be tossed about by the waves, and likely slowly freeze to death, before remembering just who had given her the Pokemon, and what little use she was ever be without any Pokemon to speak of.

She weighed the risk against the benefits, muttered a quiet, uncharacteristic curse, quickly kicked off her heavy boots, and waded into the water, shivering as she did so. Then a little ways in, the beach dropped out from under her, as she had just stepped off the side of an incredibly steep decline. On one side, the water was a couple of feet deep, on the other…

She swam to the surface once more, which took up a few more precious seconds, and began to look around for her Piplup. For a few moments, all she saw were the endless choppy waves characteristic of Sinnoh seas. Then she spotted a hint of light blue disappear beneath one of the waves, and dove after it.

Shelly was cold…so cold…and only getting colder. She could never manage to catch her breath in the brief moments that she was above water. She was so numb by now that she could hardly tell that she was running out of air. She saw a hint of white amongst the blackish-blue of the water, and then she closed her eyes. She was so tired…

She grasped blindly at water. Just water. There was no way she'd ever find her Piplup in all this water. Just as she realized that fact, she felt her hand brush something, wrapped her arm loosely around it, and swam towards the faint light she could distinguish from the dark of the rest of the water.

As she reached the surface of the water, she gulped in air, opened her eyes, and looked down at the limp, but still faintly breathing Piplup that she had received, and named Shelly, and so quickly nearly lost.

She saw the shore behind her, and tried to move her limbs, but she was just too cold. She didn't panic. She couldn't panic. She couldn't move either. She was afraid she'd sink again, but something was keeping her afloat.

She looked around, and her eyes fell upon the lightweight black rings wrapped around her arms, which had always been there, as long as she could remember. Whatever they were, they were keeping her from sinking now.

She tried harder to swim to shore, and finally managed to get her legs to cooperate enough to make some progress. It wasn't enough. Shelly could die if she wasn't faster.

With her last scraps of energy, she kicked at the icy, Sinnoh water, until her feet hit the decline that had caused some of the trouble. She waded weakly back to the shore, where she lay, shivering, freezing, curled around her oh-so-cold Piplup.

She was tired, more tired than she could ever remember being, but she struggled to stay awake regardless. She had to do something. She had to get Shelly to a Pokemon Center. She'd be useless without a Pokemon.

If sheer willpower were enough, she would get right up. She would get Shelly to the Pokemon Center and make sure she was fine. However much she willed her tired limbs to move however, she couldn't get up, she couldn't move, and she knew she'd never be able to reach the Pokemon Center in her current state.

She shivered, and gave up on that, focusing instead on staying awake, and watching Shelly to make sure the little Piplup kept breathing.

Eventually, the cold became too much for the both of them…and they kept going regardless.

Shelly was unconsciously determined to stay alive, despite the fact that everything in her was telling her to give up and freeze to death.

Ceres was determined to stay awake, to watch the over the Piplup. She'd be useless without a Pokemon. She needed Shelly to live.

Out of the corner of her eye, Ceres saw the silhouette of a circling bird. Waiting for them to die perhaps? She glared at the silhouette weakly, and remained curled around Shelly, not about to let some filthy scavenger damage her any further.

It was still so cold, and there was only so much that willpower could do. The bird still circled, watching the two closely. Shelly and Ceres were still fighting, the first to live, the second to keep watch over the first.

And then, despite her best efforts, one of the two just couldn't fight any longer.


	3. Chapter 2: Tabitha

Chapter 2: Tabitha

He chirped at them to wake up, to no avail. He landed on the arm of the human, digging his tiny talons into her cold skin, but she didn't wake up.

He circled overhead a few more times, nervously chattering to himself, unsure of what to do about the two not-quite-dead creatures collapsed on the beach. Then he noticed the black pouch lying nearby the human. He grimaced, but swooped towards it regardless, picking it open with his beam and talons, and taking out a minimized pokeball.

Then he flew away, as quickly as he could, leaving the human and the Pokemon lying on the beach, if only temporarily.

He zoomed towards the building at top speed, almost forgetting to slow down before he hit the glass doors. As it was, he only had time to slow enough to hit the door softer than he originally would have. He bounced off of it with a slight plunk, and then fell to the ground, his vision slightly blurred from the force of the impact.

For a moment, nothing happened. Then the doors were opened, and a familiar nurse, and a familiar Chansey came running out.

"Oh you poor thing!" remarked the nurse, "The wild Starly these days just don't know not to run into glass…Chansey, will you bring him inside?"

That did it. He immediately jumped to his feet, chirping loudly, dropping the pokeball he had been holding in his beak, and obviously startling the poor Chansey who had been trying to help him.

"Is something wrong?" the nurse asked obliviously. For a moment he was tempted to continue yelling at her, but then he remembered the two oh-so-cold creatures lying half-dead on the beach, and his chirp became one of urgency. He picked the pokeball back up off the ground, and fluttered shakily into the air, ensuring that the nurse could see it.

"Oh, you have a trainer?" she asked.

He nodded, cursing himself internally for doing so, and inclined his head towards the beach.

"Is your trainer hurt?" the nurse asked.

He shot her a glare. Why else would he have come to the only medical center in town if the human hadn't been hurt? How stupid did this nurse think Pokemon were? He forced a simple nod, and inclined his head towards the beach again.

"Where is your trainer? Can you take me there?" the nurse asked slowly.

The Starly was about ready to forget the dying creature and peck the stupid nurse to death. Regardless, he nodded, and began to fly off towards the beach.

"Come on Chansey!" the nurse said from behind him.

He flew quickly and urgently; hoping that the two hadn't died in the precious time the idiot nurse had wasted.

The nurse and her Chansey followed closely, mostly keeping pace with the Starly.

As he reached the beach, he landed, watching the two mostly-still figures closely. He was glad to see that they were still breathing.

"Chansey," the nurse said as soon as she saw the two, "go back to the center, find Happiny, and give her that oval stone she's so fond of, come back with a stretcher and a medical kit, got it?"

The Chansey nodded in confirmation, a determined look on her face, and raced back towards the center, faster than the Starly thought something so rotund, with such stubby little legs could move.

Soon the Chansey was back with another Chansey, the two carrying a stretcher and a medical bag atop their heads.

Before he knew it, they were all back at the center, nurse and Pokemon alike rushing urgently about the tiny building, looking for things that, for the most part, weren't there. One couldn't expect too much of a tiny town like Sandgem.

Still, it was obvious that they were doing their best. The Starly just hoped that it would be enough.

The human twitched slightly, but no one seemed to notice. No one else saw what she was seeing.

A young girl with light brown hair was running down a hallway, glancing back over her shoulder occasionally, as if searching for an invisible pursuer.

She seemed exhausted, her breath coming in short, frantic gasps, a pained expression on her face. It was obvious that she had been running for quite some time.

The gray tiles beneath her feet blurred suddenly, and she shot forward faster than should have been possible. When she returned to normal speed however, she seemed more fatigued than before.

She stopped for a moment, wheezing and unable to catch her breath.

Faint footsteps could be heard; rapidly growing louder as the one who was chasing her drew closer.

Despite her weariness, the girl began running again, although slower than before. It was obvious that she had two pursuers by now, rather than one. As they drew closer, their blurred synchronized tempos separated into two distinct, but relatively even rhythms.

They seemed to keep a consistent allegro, while she was barely managing a quick andante.

She stopped suddenly, despite the closeness of the ones who were chasing her. She couldn't run any longer. She'd come to a dead end.

She looked around desperately as their footsteps drew closer, before ducking unthinkingly into a doorway to her left. It was then that she knew she was trapped. She knew for sure that she was out of time.

The human's eyes shot open suddenly, and she began screaming and thrashing. The Starly fell off the shelf that had been serving as his temporary perch with a startled squawk. The one nurse and two Chansey rushed around frantically, utterly panicking, unable to think of what to do.

"Calm down," the nurse pleaded with her. She didn't seem to hear, although whether it was because of how loudly she was screaming, or due to the fact that she wasn't truly conscious was not clear.

She awoke suddenly, more than a half a day later, her eyes opening and focusing almost robotically. She rolled out of the bed she had been lying in, and got to her feet. Immediately she began pacing, her balance perfect despite how long she had been lying down.

It was Chansey's job to alert the nurse of such developments. Unfortunately, Chansey has fallen asleep at her post, as it were, and sat, snoring, in a rather comfortable chair in the center of the room, between the bed that had held the human patient, and the bed that still held the Piplup.

Suddenly noticing the Piplup, she turned and walked towards the Pokemon's bed, ignoring the uncomfortable feel of the still-ever-so-slightly-damp dress she was wearing. She stopped suddenly just before running into the side of the bed, and knelt beside her still-sleeping Piplup.

The Pokemon looked much better. Although her feathers still looked to be slightly damp, she was breathing normally, and not shivering like the last time Ceres had seen her.

She heard a flutter of wings, and whirled around suddenly to see the same bird from early, now obviously a Starly, land beside her Pokemon on the side of the bed.

He muttered something in a muffled chirp, and dropped a minimized pokeball beside her.

"You want to be captured," she said. It was not a question, but the Starly nodded nonetheless.

Ceres pressed the button on the pokeball to enlarge it, and tapped in gently against the Starly's beak.

The Pokemon became little more than particles of light, which were quickly absorbed by the pokeball. The Starly didn't bother to struggle, and the pokeball made a soft plink, announcing a successful capture.

"…Tabitha," Ceres muttered, before letting the Pokemon back out of the Pokeball.

The newly named Tabitha chattered incessantly to himself about how stupid he was to actually ask to be captured.

Ceres seemed to notice something odd for a moment, and stared blankly at the Starly.

Tabitha ruffled his feathers; embarrassed at the odd stare he was getting from the human.

She redirected her gaze to her Piplup once more, just in time to see the Pokemon slowly open her eyes, and shake her head, with a disoriented sort of warbling.

"I suppose we should leave then," Ceres said, watching as her Piplup stood up, stretched, and walked unsteadily towards Ceres, nearly falling off the edge of the bed, and instead, falling into Tabitha, who gave her an irritated glare, and ruffled his feathers once more.

She mumbled an apology, and stumbled backwards, being absorbed by a pokeball in a red beam of light just in time to avoid falling off the other side of the bed.

Ceres began to walk out of the room, and Tabitha followed her, his wings flapping rather loudly, but not loudly enough to wake the Chansey asleep in the chair, nor the nurse who had fallen asleep, slumped against the front counter.

Ceres glanced fleetingly at the clock. It wasn't too late. The nurse and Pokemon must have merely been exhausted. She walked out of the Pokemon Center, and started off towards the next route, hurrying to make up for lost time. If she wanted to meet all her deadlines, a leisurely pace was out of the question.

She walked quickly through patches of tall grass, Tabitha taking out any wild Pokemon that tried to bother her. She paid no attention to the wild Pokemon, or to her own. She was watching the clouds move oh-so-slowly through the evening sky, the sun only just beginning to set over the horizon.

Night had fallen by the time they reached Jubilife, although it was difficult to tell. The city was loud and bright, and everyone still seemed to be awake.

"Could I interest you in a Poketch?" someone asked suddenly from behind her.

She entirely ignored the voice, and kept walking.

The speaker, a stout, balding man, was jogging to keep pace with her, "All you have to do is find the three Poketch clowns!"

She made a short clicking sound in the back of her throat, and Tabitha dove at the man, attacking him relentlessly with his newest move, his body a blur with Quick Attack after Quick Attack.

Ceres clicked again, and Tabitha stopped attacking the man, who got unsteadily to his feet, and ran off, wheezing and shouting something insanely about vicious Starly. Tabitha flew back to Ceres, keeping relatively good pace with her.

They had worked out the little attack plan on the way to Jubilife, in case Ceres was unable to call out orders. It meant: use your most effective offensive attack, no questions asked, and Tabitha was sticking to it very well so far.

It didn't take them long to locate the city's Pokemon center. Ceres recalled Tabitha, and handed both occupied pokeballs in her possession to one of the nurses running the center.

Soon, Ceres was walking down the Jubilife streets once more, Tabitha at her side, and Shelly in her pokeball for safekeeping.

As they were walking, Ceres noticed an odd man in a strange overcoat hiding behind a lamppost across the street from where she was walking. She spared him not a moment's glance, but regardless, he ran across the street, nearly getting hit by a few cars, whose drivers shouted angry, obscene words at him before driving off more quickly than the speed limit would usually allow.

The strange man stopped directly in front of Ceres, shouting, "How did you know I was a member of the international police?"

Ceres froze suddenly, although she had intended to walk right by the man, and deal with him as she had the first.

"You were the one who walked up to me," she replied carefully.

"I am the one who is asking these questions! Do not interrupt!" shouted the man.

Ceres' expression remained neutral, and she said nothing.

"Have you seen any members of the Team known as Galactic around here?" he asked, still shouting.

She remained utterly silent for a long while.

"Thank you for your help citizen!" he yelled.

With another soft click, Tabitha began Quick Attacking the odd man, who shouted again, and once more ran across the street, nearly avoiding getting hit by the cars of driver's with even fouler mouths than the first few.

Tabitha didn't follow him, and Ceres began walking again, her pace quickening as the city's exit came into view.

"Wait!" shouted another man, "You should visit the trainer's school first!"

Tabitha didn't even need orders to deal with this man the same way as the two before him.

"My eye!" Ceres heard from somewhere behind her. She ignored the man's shouts, and walked out of Jubilife City, the din instantly dimming when she stepped out of the city's boundaries, and onto the next route. Tabitha once more appeared at her side.

"You! You're the one who just attacked Officer Looker!" someone wheezed from behind her, "You and me, battle right now!"


	4. Chapter 3: Oreburgh

Chapter 3: Oreburgh

She turned to see a boy with messy blond hair pull a pokeball out of the pocket of a brown overcoat he was wearing, which looked similar to the one that the odd lamppost man had been wearing earlier.

"Go Starly!" he shouted.

Tabitha started to fly off, to attack the Starly, but Ceres recalled the bird mid-flight. She selected her other pokeball instead, and threw it into the fray, saying, quite calmly, "Shelly, Bubble."

He Piplup appeared in a flash of white light, and shot an unsteady stream of bubbles at the Starly.

"Dodge it!" shouted the messy-haired blond boy.

The Starly was too close to the source of the attack to dodge, swerving inexpertly directly into the attack's path, taking a sort of critical hit before slamming into the ground.

"W-Well…let's see how well your stupid water type does against my Turtwig!" stammered the boy, recalling his Starly, and fumbling around in his overcoat pocket for his other pokeball. The pokeball fell from his hand, hitting the ground, and failing to release the Pokemon.

The boy blushed furiously, and bent down to pick up the pokeball, finally managing to successfully send out his Pokemon, with a cry of, "Turtwig, Absorb!"

A little turtle appeared, but had time to absorb no more than one or two little orbs of green energy from Shelly before the Piplup was recalled, and replaced once more with Tabitha.

"Quick Attack!" Ceres ordered. Tabitha began to perform the attack, but zoomed right past the Turtwig instead, hitting it with one wing, causing it to tumble onto its back, its stubby turtle legs waving frantically in the air. He doubled back then, the strike from his other wing sending the Turtwig flying a few feet into the air, before coming back down and hitting the ground with a dull thump, obviously having fainted.

"Wing Attack," Ceres observed, "Good, but try to follow orders next time."

Tabitha puffed up his feathers proudly, and flew back over to fly in place beside Ceres.

"I don't get it!" shouted the messy-haired boy in the brown overcoat, after he had recalled his Turtwig, "How could I, a junior member of the international police, training under the great Officer Looker, lose?"

"I thank you sincerely for telling me exactly who you are. I'll try to avoid you in the future," Ceres muttered, doubting she could be heard over the boy's disbelieving rambling. "Come Tabitha, I was supposed to be in the next town before the sun set. I needn't be any later than I already am…"

She turned away from the messy-haired boy and Jubilife City, and began to head once more for her destination.

"Wait! You're under arrest for assaulting a police officer!" shouted the boy from a ways behind her.

She smirked slightly, tossed a pokeball behind her, and muttered, "Shelly, Bubble."

Then she quickly began to walk, Tabitha flying nonchalantly alongside her, Shelly trying to do the same, but finding it difficult to ignore the screams of pain coming from the boy behind him and each of the semi-acidic bubbles from her attack popped near him.

Ceres must have had some reason to tell her to attack the human. Perhaps he was a bad person, trying to hurt her. At this thought, she spun, and unleashed another Bubble attacking before running off in the opposite direction to follow her trainer.

In moments, the three of them were gone, having disappeared into a cave connecting Jubilife and the town adjacent to it, Oreburgh.

A few junior trainers demanded that Ceres battle them, and were entirely ignored. She was in a hurry. A few followed her, intent on battling, but she was soon too far ahead of them in the murky blackness of the cave, and each one turned back eventually, perhaps afraid of getting lost if they strayed too far from the light leading to Jubilife.

By the time they reached the end of the cave, Shelly and Tabitha were struggling to keep up with their trainer, and even Ceres looked slightly tired.

She turned back to her Pokemon, held out their pokeballs, and said, "Return." Red beams of light from their respective pokeballs absorbed both Shelly and Tabitha. Then Ceres turned back towards her destination and kept walking.

She walked towards a rather fancy building, with a sign reading: 'Oreburgh Museum'. On the door were the times when the museum opened and closed for each respective day of the week. Thanks to the little incident at Sandgem Town's beach, she had about five minutes to complete her mission. She glared at the little sign, as if that would make the times change.

A moment later, she pushed open the doors of the museum, and ran inside.

"Um, excuse me, we're closing soon, so−"

She ignored the voice, and released on of her Pokemon, giving a short order, running ahead before the attack had a chance to take effect, and ignoring the startled and pained shouts from the people at the museum's admission gate.

She ran around, glancing at the exhibits, before finally finding the object she was looking for. She quickly picked up the object from its podium, thankful that no glass protected it, and ran through the remains of the fading cloud of bubbles Shelly had created, picking up her Piplup in the arm that didn't hold the artifact she had come for.

She ran out of the museum doors, almost running right into a man who looked as if he'd just come back from a coal mine.

"And just where do you think you're going?" he asked, scowling at her, and taking a pokeball off of his belt. "Stop her, Cranidos!"

She ran again, swerving around him, and dashing off quickly.

Looking over her shoulder, she spotted a small, dinosaur-like Pokemon about to catch up with her.

She stopped suddenly, but the Pokemon continued its charge.

Just as it was about to reach her, she jumped aside, and it crashed into a rock.

"Geodude, Onix, help Cranidos out!" shouted the miner, tossing two more pokeballs, from which a large, snake-like Pokemon, and what looked to be a floating boulder with arms appeared.

"Shelly, bubble!" she shouted, dropping the Piplup, who immediately fired a Bubble attack at the boulder creature.

"Geodude!" screamed the rock, falling to the ground with a dull thump.

The snake Pokemon known as Onix swung his rocky tail at Ceres and Shelly, and Ceres couldn't formulate any kind of logical plan in time to avoid the attack.

The Cranidos watched them smugly for a moment, before realizing that he was also in range of the attack, and dashing off. Luckily for him, he was a ways behind Ceres and Shelly, and actually had time to get away.

Suddenly, a Pokemon, nearly identical to the Geodude belonging to the miner, whose size utterly paled in comparison to that of giant rock creature, stopped the Onix's tail short. She cried out as she struggled to hold back the tail. She shouted something that sounded like 'run', and they did, just as the tail finally swept her back, sending her skidding across the dusty, rocky ground.

The Onix turned its attention away from the tiny Geodude, only to get a face full of a Bubble attack, powered up by Shelly's Torrent ability. The tired little Piplup began wheezing as the giant Onix collapsed with a roar, squashing a thankfully unoccupied half of the museum.

Shelly stared tiredly but proudly at the unconscious rock-type, and let out a victorious little chirp. She didn't see the Cranidos charging towards her. Ceres did, and quickly reached for Shelly's pokeball.

The Piplup began to disappear into the red light of her pokeball, but was abruptly stopped as the Cranidos slammed into her back before she could be fully recalled, a blackish aura about him. She was sent flying, and hit a nearby rock with a thump.

"Pursuit," the miner said coldly, standing beside his Pokemon, "Return the article, or your Piplup won't be the only one to die today."

Ceres clutched the artifact she held tightly, and gave the miner a defiant glare.

"Have it your way," the miner said with a shrug, "Cranidos, Headbutt."

The dinosaur Pokemon charged towards her, and she held her ground once more, although she truly hadn't the energy to jump out of its way once more.

Suddenly, the Cranidos was stopped, its head slamming into the palm of the Geodude who had earlier come to her rescue.

It muttered something, and she froze. It almost seemed as if…she pushed the thought away, and her expression turned once more to one of neutrality.

The Cranidos seemed to smirk at the Geodude, and reared back, before slamming into her palm once more.

The Geodude drifted back about an inch, in obvious pain, but not about to give up until the very end. Ceres could see however, that the end would be quick in coming. Tabitha didn't stand a chance against a Rock Type.

The Cranidos used Headbutt one more time, and this time, a loud crack accompanied it. The Geodude cried out in agony as her hand, and lower arm shattered.

"Now Cranidos, finish it with one more Headbutt," said the miner.

Cranidos reared back, ready to deal the finishing blow. The Geodude closed her eyes, in too much pain to do anything more than wait for death.

Suddenly something hit the Cranidos, sending it skidding across sharp pebbles, and directly into a rock, where it laid entirely still, a few bubbles still popping around it.

Ceres' gaze immediately fell on the source of the attack. Where her little Piplup had lay, there stood a powerful Prinplup, looking quite a bit more angry than she was tired; as she had before evolving.

"The tables have turned," Ceres said with a smirk.

The miner's face paled, and he ran, leaving his unconscious Pokemon behind.

Ceres nodded to Shelly, who walked, with a dignified air about her, back to her trainer.

The Prinplup resisted the urge to run to Ceres, and give her a hug like she'd always seen in movies when a Pokemon won an important battle. She knew her trainer would disapprove.

Ceres turned her attention away from her newly evolved Prinplup, as if the Pokemon had not just secured a spectacular victory, and focused instead on the injured Geodude lying painfully on the rocky ground.

The pokeball she threw made a soft clink sound as it hit the Geodude's rocky skin. Nonetheless, the Pokemon was absorbed by the ball, which shook only once before stopping, the Pokemon inside too tired to put up much of a fight.

Ceres walked over to pick up the Pokeball, muttering, "Soot," as she did so. She minimized the pokeball, dropped it into the little black bag with the other, and motioned to Shelly to follow her.

They left the town, one walking rather quickly, and the other sliding smoothly on her belly across pebble-free dirt, he new sleek feathers easing her travel. They moved quickly, and escaped just in time to avoid all the people who came running out of their houses to see what the commotion was about.

By the time the police arrived, they were hidden away in Jubilife City, Shelly resting, Tabitha out of his pokeball, complaining to her about missing the fight, and Ceres trying her best to ease the suffering of Soot, her new Geodude, while still keeping an eye on the object that she had stolen from the Oreburgh Museum.

She had found a half-full Super Potion in a nearby trashcan, and despite having her doubts about the benefits of using a potion someone had thrown away, on her Pokemon, she decided it would have to do. She wasn't about to look for a Pokemon Center, for fear of running into the police so soon after stealing from a somewhat well-known museum.

The half-Super Potion was doing wonders for Soot, who had stopped shouting, and was resting, only somewhat uncomfortably, against a molding cardboard box, balancing on her remaining arm.

"Tomorrow we'll set out for Sandgem Town," she muttered; ready to run the risk of encountering the police if it meant a chance at obtaining the local Professor's research notes. If they could harness the power of a Pokemon's evolution…

She smirked, glancing over at her newly evolved Prinplup, thinking of how much more powerful the tiny Piplup had become after evolving.

If she managed to steal the notes…they'd surely succeed.


	5. Chapter 4: Evolution

Chapter 4: Evolution

"So Lucas, where is this friend of yours?" a brusque voice asked, the speaker giving Lucas a stern look. "It is vital that we get these notes to my colleague in Jubilife! Am I to go with only _you _to protect them?"

"Professor Rowan, I know she'll show up! Even if she doesn't, Blaze and I can protect you, right Blaze?" Lucas asked rather huffily.

When no reply came from the Chimchar, he spun to face where the little fire monkey had been sitting, only to find that his Pokemon had disappeared.

"Char!" called the Pokemon from a little ways away. Blaze was staring out towards Jubilife.

"Even your Pokemon seems to want to leave, Lucas," Professor Rowan said.

"Come back over here then," Lucas called, somewhat reluctantly to his Chimchar, "and we'll get going."

Blaze wasn't at all inclined to move however, and wasn't particularly keen on leaving. He was not staring eagerly at the path to Jubilife, reading to head out on an adventure. He was instead closely watching an approaching figure.

"Blaze!" his trainer called again.

He shuddered, called back, "Chim-char!" and raced towards Lucas as fast as his tiny legs could carry him.

"Finally, I thought you'd never come back…I guess we have to go without her- Wait, there she is!" his trainer exclaimed happily, pointing at something in the direction of where he had been standing moments ago.

The Chimchar looked over his shoulder, and let out a strangled cry at seeing the same creature he had earlier noticed approaching, walking straight towards them.

"You made it!" his trainer said with a grin.

The one his trainer had greeted nodded once, not even looking at the boy as she did so. She seemed instead to be meeting the gaze of Professor Rowan.

For a time there was silence, neither the girl nor the professor willing to break eye contact. After a few minutes in which the staring war persisted, and Lucas stood around looking quite confused, Professor Rowan blinked once, turned to him, and said, "We'll head to Jubilife then."

It was then that Blaze noticed the Pokemon beside the girl. She was a Prinplup (something Blaze had learned in his time at the lab), who seemed to have an air of stifled curiosity about her.

"Cha?" he asked, tilting his head faintly to the side.

"Pri-" a quick glance from her trainer immediately silenced the Prinplup, and in a fraction of a second, the Pokemon's relaxed and curious demeanor instantly vanished. She gave Blaze a slight glance of apology, before adjusting her posture from faintly sloppy, to regal in an instant.

Blaze stared at the Prinplup in awe for a few minutes, before she glanced at his once more, causing him to turn away quickly to hide his blush. It wasn't polite to stare, after all.

"We shouldn't fall behind," the Prinplup's trainer said, beginning a strangely even walk towards the retreating figures of Lucas and Professor Rowan. Her Prinplup followed, although less than perfectly.

Blaze ran to catch up with his trainer, but stopped just behind the Prinplup's trainer instead, not daring to pass her.

"Blaze?" Lucas called, and the little Chimchar steeled his nerves and ran ahead of the strange trainer and her enigmatic Prinplup. He jumped clumsily onto his trainer's shoulder, nearly slipping, and ended up clinging to Lucas' backpack instead of sitting where he had originally meant.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the Prinplup stifle a slight giggle before she was silenced once more by a glance from her trainer. He turned away, his face as red as the flame on his tail, and scrambled up his trainer's backpack, to sit on his hat instead.

"Blaze," Lucas scolded with a stifled laugh, "we have to prove to Professor Rowan that we're serious about this job, okay? How are we supposed to do that when I look like I replaced my hat with a Chimchar.

"Cha-Char…" Blaze muttered apologetically, slowly climbing onto his trainer's shoulder, and then down his arm until his feet hit the ground. By that time however, they had reached Jubilife City.

"You know, on second thought, it might be better if I carry you," Lucas muttered, nervously glancing at the cars zooming past them on the roads that ran through the city. Blaze eluded his trainer's attempt to pick him up however, chattering angrily at him.

If the Prinplup could walk, he could too. He didn't need to look any dumber in front of her than he already had.

"Alright," Lucas said, sounding a bit puzzled, "Stay close though…don't get yourself hurt."

Blaze nodded impatiently. He could take care of himself after all.

"My colleague lives in the northern part of Jubilife," Professor Rowan started, "Can I trust you two to safely escort me to her home?"

"Yes Professor! Of course Professor!" Lucas chirped with an overdramatic salute.

Blaze noted that the girl who had accompanied them merely nodded.

"Then we should begin walking, we're wasting precious time standing around here," Professor Rowan said, walking away.

"Right away Professor!" Lucas exclaimed, "Come on, let's go- Um…I don't think I ever heard you tell me your name…" He gave the Prinplup's trainer a puzzled look.

"It would be strange if you had," the girl said, beginning to walk, "I never told you my name, and do not intend to."

Lucas stared after her for a few long before running to catch up with both her and the Professor.

Blaze easily followed his trainer, but avoiding getting near the girl who would not tell them her name. Something about her made him extremely uneasily.

They walked uneventfully for a very long while, until Blaze's legs started to ache. He was beginning to believe that they'd never reach their destination.

"Here we are!" Rowan suddenly announced, coming to such a sudden stop with such little warning, that Lucas nearly crashed into him.

The nameless girl stopped on a dime without any sort of difficulty whatsoever.

"Stop right there Professor of Pokemon!" someone shouted, jumping out in front of the Professor, blocking the door to his colleague's house. He was wearing an odd outfit that made him look much like a spaceman.

"Hand over those research notes!" shouted a second person, dressed in an outfit identical to the first's, snatching Professor Rowan's briefcase out of his hands.

Professor Rowan gave the thieves a harsh glare, and they would have returned the briefcase immediately if they had not caught sight of another member of Rowan's small party.

"We won't return it!" said the first.

"Go Wurmple!" shouted the second, releasing a small, caterpillar-like Pokemon from a pokeball.

The nearly identical first man followed suit, releasing a nearly identical Wurmple.

Blaze, indignant at the theft of the notes he had been meant to protect, quickly released an Ember. There were a few screams from the startled humans nearby. He recognized a particularily high-pitched scream as that of his trainer, and made a note to apologize later.

When the smoke and flames faded away, he expected to see two badly scorched enemy Wurmple. Instead, he saw an injured Prinplup. He had accidentally hit her with his attack instead of the Wurmple!

He began apologizing profusely, berating himself for his stupidity, while all the while the Wurmple and spacemen laughed.

Suddenly, the Prinplup hopped to her feet, glared at the enemy Wurmples, and knocked them both out with a quick Bubblebeam.

The spacemen weren't laughing anymore.

The Prinplup's trainer walked slowly forward.

"Give me the briefcase," she said. It was quite obviously not a request.

"Wh-Whatever you say Ma'am," the one with the briefcase stammered, handing it to her without the slightest bit of argument.

Lucas was in awe. These spacemen would stand up to Professor Rowan, but immediately gave up when _she _asked them for the suitcase? It didn't make sense.

"Way to go," he said, "Now we should get those notes to Professor Rowan's colleague…he must really be wondering where they are by now…"

"Don't worry," she stated emotionlessly, "he's not worrying about them…in fact, I greatly doubt she's worrying about much of anything right now."

"W-What do you mean?" Lucas stammered.

Her Prinplup blinked.

"I won't be returning these notes," Ceres went on, not answering his question, "Goodbye."

On her cue, despite her confusion at what her trainer had just said, Shelly used yet another Bubblebeam attacking, filling the air with the innocent-looking, but acidic bubbles she had become used to as a means of escape.

When the bubbles cleared they revealed two unconscious, but faintly breathing spacemen who had apparently taken the brunt of the Bubblebeam attack, a confused Lucas, who was muttering to himself, and an uncharacteristically horrified-looking Professor Rowan. Lucas had returned Blaze to his pokeball before the bubbles had cleared.

"What did she mean Professor?" Lucas asked, "When she said she doubts she's worrying about anything at all right now? Why'd she take the research notes?"

He hadn't noticed the matching G's on both her outfit, and the outfits of the spacemen. Professor Rowan had, but was too shocked by what he had heard to answer. Too shocked even, to wonder why she attacked her own teammates.

"Stay out here," he told Lucas, stepping over the unconscious spacemen to open the door to his colleague's house.

"But-"

"That's an _order_," he stated quite firmly, although his voice was shaking slightly, too slightly for Lucas to notice.

"Professor-"

The door slammed, and for a long while, Lucas listened to the sounds of the city.

Professor Rowan wandered quickly through the small, and somewhat messy house.

"Roseanne?" he called, hoping he'd get some sort of response. He was instead met with nothing but silence.

This worried him even more, and his steps quickened, until he was practically running through the house, not bothering to look out for books and notes scattered about the rooms.

Finally he came to the last room in the house, where he saw his associate lying in the middle of the room, oddly still.

"Roseanne!" he exclaimed, fearing the worst. He ran over to where she lay and knelt beside her.

Upon closer inspection, she was definitely breathing, and after a few tense seconds, she slowly opened her eyes.

"Rowan?" she asked blearily.

"I'm so glad you're alright!" he exclaimed.

"What happened?" she asked softly, placing a hand carefully on her forehead, and wincing.

"I was hoping that you could tell me," Professor Rowan muttered, standing up, and helping her to her feet.

She swayed dangerously, and almost fell.

"I don't…remember…I came home from the library and…I just don't remember," she said, shaking her head forlornly, and wincing again.

They left the house slowly, Roseanne leaning heavily on Rowan so as not to fall over.

"Lucas!" Rowan called gruffly as they stepped outside, over the still-unconscious spacemen.

"Yes Professor-" the boy paused when he saw Roseanne, "What happened?"

Professor Rowan ignored his inquiry.

"Call the police."

Ceres walked slowly, ignoring the questions her Prinplup asked her, which she could almost understand, but didn't care to answer.

Eventually, Shelly stopped asking questions, and they simply walked in silence.

It would have been easy to simply walk through the cave's path, leave through the exit opposite the one that they came in through, and be done with the entire ordeal. Instead, Ceres walked deeper into the Ravaged Path, until all but a few rays of sunlight had vanished.

She took a pokeball from the bag she had caught, and tapped it lightly against something a bit above her head.

The pokeball opened, snapped shut, and clicked. Then she turned, and headed for the exit, her gaze drawn to the pokeball only long enough for her to mutter, "Marrow," before looking back to the light.

They were out of the cave soon, to the next town soon, and then they rested.

For once, Ceres allowed Shelly to enjoy the town around her. Shelly, being a water type, would have been much happier around water than in a bed of flowers, but was happy nonetheless to be able to relax, rather than constantly run.

Tabitha was quite happy to laze around the skies above Floaroma, catching the warmest breezes he could find, barely having to use his wings at all really.

Soot was asleep, always resting, her arm slowly re-growing, as living rock tends to do.

The newest member of the team stayed in her pokeball, as the light was bad for her health.

When the day ended, and the time came to return to the Pokemon Center to rest and heal, Ceres was treated like any other trainer, and Shelly, Tabitha, Soot, and Marrow like any other Pokemon.

No one in the flowery town that they had reached that day knew of what had occurred. No one seemed suspicious in the least of the briefcase she was carrying. No one questioned her call to the Valley Windworks.

No one suspected a thing. Perhaps no one ever would.


	6. Chapter 5: Valley Windworks

Chapter 5: Windworks

"Please help me!"

Ceres stared indifferently at the obviously upset little girl before her.

"Some bad spacemen took my daddy! They won't let him go! I want my daddy back!" She then began crying.

Ceres turned on her heel, and began to walk the other way.

"Trainer, wait! Please wait!" cried the little girl upon noticing her departure.

Ceres didn't stop for a moment.

"I-I didn't wanna do this…but you aren't being very nice!" the little girl whined, "Go, Floony!"

Ceres stopped to let Marrow out of her pokeball. The Zubat was almost immediately hit by a Gust attack from the Pokemon apparently owned by the girl. Ceres noted the damage done by the attack, and recalled Marrow.

"Of course I'll help you," she said.

The little girl looked confused for a moment, and her Pokemon, a purple, balloon-like creature drifted over to float beside her.

"My Pokemon are all tired out from battling wild ones," Ceres stated dully, "They can't fight the bad guys who took your daddy when they're hurt, can they? You wouldn't want them to get hurt worse, would you?"

The little girl shook her head vigorously.

"You didn't give me a chance to explain, silly girl," Ceres said, smiling slightly.

The girl's Pokemon stared uneasily at her.

"Sorry…" the girl mumbled, looking ashamed of herself for so rashly thinking that the nice trainer wouldn't help her.

"I'll go heal my Pokemon at the Pokemon Center," Ceres said, "And then I'll come right back, and help you save your daddy, okay?"

"Okay!" chirped the little girl, looking suddenly happier. As Ceres walked away, she turned to her Drifloon. "She's gonna help us save Daddy, Floony!"

"Floon…" mumbled the balloon Pokemon uneasily.

"Cheer up," the little girl said, misinterpreting the Pokemon's unease, "the bad spacemen will be gone soon!"

"Drif…" the Pokemon muttered, giving the girl a falsely sunny look.

"You're happy too, huh?" she grinned.

They waited in silence for a few more minutes, until Ceres finally reappeared, Soot beside her. The Geodude's arm had re-grown entirely under the careful watch of Floaroma Town's Nurse Joy.

"My daddy is this way!" said the little girl as Ceres and Soot approached. She ran off towards some distant windmills, her Drifloon trailing closely behind her.

Ceres and Soot followed at a rather even pace, Soot trailing behind her trainer on occasion, until they reached the windmills.

"Daddy is in that place!" the girl announced, pointing to a large building a little ways away.

Ceres nodded, and headed for the building, Soot staying close by her side, ready to protect her if they were attacked.

The guard scowled as he noticed the girl standing near Ceres.

"I've told you about a jillion times kid, there's no way I'm letting you in to see your 'daddy'!"

"So to be clear, you are _not _going to let us in, is that correct?" Ceres asked listlessly.

"That's absolutely r-" upon noticing that Ceres accompanied the little girl, the man stopped mid-sentence, and corrected himself, "wrong! That's absolutely wrong! Of course you two can go inside!"

With that, the man stepped aside, allowing Ceres and the girl to enter the building.

The trip through the building was entirely uneventful. Each guard who'd been posted stepped aside the moment he or she saw Ceres.

"You aren't so tough!" the little girl dared to say once, sticking out her tongue at one of the guards.

He shot her a sharp glare, and began to retort, only to wisely remain silent when he remembered who was accompanying the girl.

"I guess…you're right…" he grumbled reluctantly, receiving nothing but an ambiguous glance from Ceres in reply.

"Let's keep going," she said to the girl, "Your daddy is waiting."

"Yup!" nodded the girl, running ahead.

"Hey! What are you doing here! Who let you in?" called a guard from somewhere ahead.

He spotted the guard who had let the girl pass by without so much as a fight, and glared. The aforementioned guard tried to discreetly signal to the other that what he was about to do was a very bad idea. His warning was ignored.

"Go, Wurmple!" shouted the guard, and an angry, but not very threatening-looking worm Pokemon appeared before him. "Tackle!"

Instead of hitting its attack's intended target, the worm slammed into Soot with a sort of 'sploosh' sound, and then fell to the ground, knocked out by the impact.

"Where did you get a Pokemon?" asked the shocked guard, before noticing Ceres standing nearby, watching him closely.

"C-"

"Run ahead now," Ceres said, glancing at the girl, "I'll catch up in a moment, okay?"

The girl nodded, her eyes wide and frightened at the thought of being attacked by more Wurmple, and she ran ahead and around the corner.

"I-I didn't-"

The guard did not finish his sentence.

The little girl stopped to catch her breath, and her Drifloon looked worriedly at her.

"I'm okay Floony, I'm just glad that icky worm didn't hurt you!" the girl said, meeting her Pokemon's worried glance. Then she noticed that the trainer who was helping them get though the building wasn't behind them anymore, and they're come quite a long way.

"She said she'd catch up but…should we go back and look for her?" The little girl was indecisive.

Her Drifloon hadn't heard her question, as he was too focused on the two Pokemon who seemed to have spotted them while they were wondering about their escort.

One of the two, a Zubat, who looked stronger than the one he had briefly faced earlier, smirked at him.

The other stepped back, and muttered for her companion to make the first move.

The Zubat nodded and flew towards the girl's Drifloon, ready to attack with a super-effective Bite.

"Floony!" the little girl cried, finally noticing their predicament.

Once more, an attack hit Soot rather than the Pokemon hit was meant for. As her teeth met Soot's arm, the Zubat screeched in pain, and flew back, regretting attacking in the first place.

Soot began to prepare a Rock Throw attack.

"Yeah, get the bad Pokemon that tried to hurt Floony!" the little girl cheered.

Soot was about to attack when she was stopped by a curt, "don't," from her trainer. The rocks that she held fell harmlessly to the ground.

"What about the mean Pokemon?" the little girl whined, still watching the Zubat carefully out of the corner of her eye.

"Why hurt them needlessly? They know better to attack us now, don't they?" Ceres asked, also watching the Zubat.

The bat Pokemon looked confused, and gave no sort of reply. Her companion scoffed at Ceres. She wouldn't take orders from anyone but her trainer, especially vague, indirect ones from complete strangers.

"See?" Ceres said, when the second Pokemon, which she knew to be a Purugly, did little more than glare rather nastily at her.

"I-I guess…are we going to save daddy now?" she little girl asked.

Ceres glanced at her, and then at the Pokemon blocking their way, and then at their trainer, who had seemingly just arrived.

Despite the fact that Ceres was sure that she had never met the trainer before, the woman looked familiar, although she was unsure as to where she would have ever met someone with hair so vibrantly red, or with an outfit as unique as the one the woman happened to be wearing.

It occurred to her that the colors and design of the outfit were similar to those of the guards, and to the one she had first answered to, as well as to her own. Perhaps that was why she seemed so familiar. Still…

"What are you doing here?" the Pokemon's trainer asked, sounding vaguely annoyed.

Ceres couldn't tell if the question was directed at her, or the little girl who accompanied her.

The little girl hid behind Ceres for a moment before getting up the courage to say what she had come to say. She stepped out from behind the trainer who had helped her, and bravely announced, "I wanna see my daddy. I want you mean space-people to let him go!"

"And why should I?" the strangely familiar woman asked, giving the little girl a disdainful look.

"Because if you don't…" the girl paused, thinking. "If you don't…my nice trainer friend will make you!" She put on an angry, determined face, and shot a rather adorable, not-at-all threatening glare in the woman's direction.

"She will, will she?" Ceres was spared a single glance. The woman smirked. "Are you entirely sure about that, little girl?"

"Of- Of course! Of course she will!" The girl responded, blindly trusting. The Drifloon beside her looked entirely doubtful however. He didn't trust the girl as far as he could through her, and considering he was weak enough to be blown away by a strong wind, that was saying a lot!

A name came to Ceres' mind suddenly.

"Mars," she said, and then fell silent, unsure of where she had heard the name before, or to whom it referred.

The red-haired woman turned to look at her once more, looking quite surprised for some reason. Perhaps they hadn't ever met.

"Yes?" she inquired after a few moments of silence.

Ceres remained silent for another few seconds, and then said, "Perhaps you could let the little girl see her father…and then we can speak…elsewhere."

Mars still seemed a bit unsure of what exactly she was trying to say for a second, but an instant later it was apparent that she understood

"Well…come on then little girl. Let's go see your daddy, m'kay?" Mars said, faking a hospitable smile.

"'Kay!" the girl said obliviously.

"Floon!" her Drifloon cried, immediately suspicious of the red-haired woman.

"It's okay Floony, she's gonna take us to see daddy," the girl assured the Pokemon.

"That's right, right this way," Mars said, beginning to walk away. The little girl followed her, and was closely trailed by Mars' Zubat and Purugly.

The girl's Drifloon hung back for a moment, before deciding to follow. It never got the chance to do so, however.

"Do we have what we need?" Mars asked immediately as she walked into the room.

"We've collected all the energy we need," a balding, pale lavender-haired man responded, "We've no more use for _him_." He pointed vaguely at an exhausted-looking man in a lab coat.

"What are you going to do with the energy…?" the man asked tiredly.

"None of your business!" the balding man replied, "Mars, be a dear and deal with him, will you?"

"Don't tell me what to do Charon! For the last time, I've been a commander longer than you, so you don't order me around, got it?" Mars paused for a moment, and then added, "You watch them, will you? I've got someone to speak to. Purugly, Zubat, let's go."

"What's going on? Aren't you gonna let us go?" asked the little girl that Ceres had escorted through the building.

"Not a chance, brat," Mars replied, rolling her eyes at the girl's naivety. She walked out of the room, her Pokemon closely behind, and slammed the door as they left.

She had not walked far before she met up with Ceres.

"What was it that you wanted to talk about?" she asked.

Ceres minimized the pokeball she was holding, the one containing the Drifloon that had formerly belonged to the little girl, putting it away with the others, and said, "Let's talk outside."

They walked through the building's hallways, passing several guards, one of which was still nursing a bruise on his head.

"S-Sorry about the earlier confusion S-Sir, I-I mean Ma'am, I mean Commander…Um-"

Ceres ignored him entirely, and Mars simply didn't bother to ask.

Ceres remained entirely silent, even as they stepped outside. She looked up at the sky, as if waiting for something.

"You wanted to talk about something?" Mars prompted again, getting slightly impatient.

Suddenly, a Staravia fell clumsily out of the sky, a briefcase landing beside him.

Ceres ignored the newly evolved Tabitha entirely and picked up the case beside him.

"The local Professor's research notes on evolution," she stated drearily, "I trust Master Cyrus can make good use of them."

She did not miss the shock Mars failed to suppress at something that she had said. She simply ignored what she has seen. Surprise was useless, was it not? Everything was to be expected. Nothing was a shock.

She dismissed Mars' apparent alarm, and began to walk away.

"Ceres?" Mars called after her.

She glanced back over her shoulder at the red-haired woman, her expression void of either curiosity, or caring.

"…Never mind."

She turned away once more and walked off, Tabitha following huffily behind, annoyed at being entirely ignored.

She had recalled Soot earlier, and had nothing to hold her to the windmill place any more. She didn't know, nor did she care, as she walked away, that she would never see the Valley Windworks again.


	7. Chapter 6: Disobedience

Chapter 6: Disobedience

"Floon!"

"Quiet, you are my Pokemon now, whether you like it or not, Eye," Ceres hissed, dragging her newly obtained Drifloon behind her as she walked.

"Floon!" Eye screeched again.

Ceres ignored his cries and rather feeble struggling, as well as the occasional attacks he sent her way. They were all weak gusts of wind and attempts to startle her. Neither seemed to faze her however.

Her other Pokemon watched the scene from a distance, with expressions ranging from pity to amusement on their faces.

"Plup…" Shelly muttered, trailing slowly behind her trainer. Certainly there were better ways to introduce a new team member.

Tabitha chirped something jokingly from above her, something about worrying too much, or being too soft-hearted.

Shelly didn't think there was anything wrong with caring a bit for your teammates.

"Zuu," hummed Marrow. It was difficult to tell if she was paying any attention to the situation at hand.

Soot remained silent, falling a bit behind the others, but still staying close enough to them as to not get lost entirely.

"Here we are," Ceres announced, without any true enthusiasm, "Eterna Forest, where time stands still." She smiled slightly, and Eye twitched uneasily, staring into the murky forest at the strange, still fog that would likely never fade.

Marrow caught up to them about then, followed closely by Tabitha and Shelly, and finally, Soot.

"Marrow, Shelly, Tabitha, Soot, Return," Ceres droned, and three of the Pokemon returned to their pokeballs almost instantly.

Ceres gave her a single, disinterested glance. Plucking the Prinplup's pokeball out of the drawstring bag that carried them, Ceres turned to the Prinplup, and held it out to her.

"Return," she repeated.

A red beam shot out of the pokeball, but narrowly missed Shelly as the Prinplup jumped out of the way.

"Prin, plup?" she asked.

If Ceres understood, she gave no indication that she was eager, or even willing, to answer the Pokemon's question. She remained utterly silent for a moment, and then attempted to return the Prinplup again.

Shelly dodged the pokeball's beam once more, and repeated her question: "Prin, plup?"

Ceres stared nonchalantly at the Pokemon, then dropped her pokeball and began to walk into Eterna Forest, a very confused Drifloon being dragged along behind her.

For a moment, Shelly stood her ground. Her trainer wouldn't actually just leave her there.

When Ceres began to fade into the fog, the Prinplup panicked, clumsily scooped up the pokeball with her wings, and ran into the forest in pursuit of her trainer.

Everywhere she looked there was endless, murky fog. Ceres was nowhere in sight.

"Plup!" she screeched, dropping the pokeball that she was carrying "Prinplup!"

Her own cries echoed back to her.

"Prinplup!" she shouted, tears beginning to form in her eyes. She scooped up the pokeball she had dropped, and ran off in a random direction, screeching at the top of her lungs in hope that someone would hear her.

After a long while, she was too tired to run, and her throat hurt from shouting. She collapsed in the cold, dewy grass, the pokeball the held falling out of her grasp once more, and rolling a ways away.

"Plup…" she wheezed.

For the longest time, it was silent. Her eyes, already half closed from exhaustion, shut entirely. The last thing she heard before losing consciousness was a faint, "Return."

For a few moments, Ceres stared down in silence at the pokeball she held. Then she minimized it, and dropped it wordlessly into the pouch that held the rest.

She tugged faintly on the arms of the unwilling Drifloon that she was still pulling around.

"Let's keep going," she said dully.

Eye kept trying to fly in the opposite direction.

"Floon!" he shouted, tugging randomly in an attempt to escape, "Floon!"

Ceres ignored him, and easily pulled him along as she walked. She was anticipating a relatively quiet and uneventful walk through the forest. That is, quiet except for the Eye's cries.

The forest had other plans.

"Excuse me!" a voice called through the fog.

Ceres didn't stop walking.

"Excuse me miss! Um, hello?"

She kept up her even pace, and the speaker soon caught up with her.

"Hello miss, um…I was wondering…could you help me get through the forest?" She turned her head slightly to see a woman with long, braided, green hair. "I heard that a frightening group called Team Galactic was about, and…I'm afraid to travel through this forest on my own…"

Ceres stopped briefly, met the woman's worried gaze, then nodded vaguely, and began to walk again.

"Oh, thank you! Don't worry, I'll keep your Pokemon healed up…and I'm Cheryl, by the way."

"Floon!" Eye said, still struggling to escape, and now trying to get this Cheryl's attention, in hopes of getting her to help him escape.

"Oh dear…don't you think you should let that Drifloon go?" Cheryl asked, and Eye attempted to nod in agreement, although it was difficult considering that his body wasn't separate from his head. "He doesn't look very happy…"

Eye tugged in yet another random direction, as if to emphasize his point.

Ceres wasn't listening. She was focused instead on a small bud-like creature that had wandered into their path.

"Eye," she said, "Use Gust."

The Pokemon glared at her, and sort of shook its head.

"Return," she muttered, surprising the Drifloon, and easily recalling him to his Pokeball. "Tabitha-"

She was cut off as a round, whitish object flew by her, and struck the Pokemon she had been hoping to capture, exploding as it did so, sending the tiny bud flying off into the fog.

Ceres turned to glare at Cheryl, and the pink, blob-shaped Pokemon beside her.

"What?" Cheryl asked innocently, "Didn't you want to defeat that Budew?"

Tabitha chose then to come out of his pokeball, wondering why his name had been called when there was no opponent for him to fight.

Ceres blinked, and her expression returned to one of neutrality. "It doesn't matter. At all."

The same fate befell the next few Budew that the two stumbled upon, and after the fifth Budew Ceres had planned to catch fainted; she turned to Cheryl once more, the omnipresent black rings on her arms glowing faintly blue, a glow barely visible in the fog, but present nonetheless.

"Is there a problem?" Cheryl asked, looking genuinely confused.

For a moment, Ceres looked faintly angry, replacing the seemingly out-of-place impartiality that usually accompanied her glares.

The bluish glow faded as quickly as it had appeared, and the faint spark in her eyes was gone.

Ceres didn't answer Cheryl's question, turned on her heel, and kept walking, Tabitha flying right by her, ready to attack the next Budew they found before Cheryl's Chansey got a chance to.

The rest of the forest, however, seemed to be entirely devoid of any Pokemon.

After a long while, the fog began to thin slightly, just enough for the forest's exit to become visible.

"Oh…we've finally made it…I have to thank you somehow…" Cheryl muttered, her expression blank for a moment. Then she smiled. "Chansey, Egg Bomb!"

Tabitha let out a startled squawk as the attack hit him, the explosion sending him flying back several feet.

To Ceres, he was only faintly visible in the fog. Only visible enough to see quite clearly that he did not so much as stir after hitting the ground.

"Why did you do that?" Ceres asked, not sounding as if she truly cared to know the answer.

"Your journey ends here 'Galactic Commander'," Cheryl said, in a voice that was distinctly not her own. "The Forest will not let you pass!"

"Soot, Rock Throw," Ceres ordered calmly. In a flash of white light, her Geodude appeared, only managing to scoop up a handful of earth before she was thrown backwards by an Egg Bomb. She, however, was not down yet, and she flung the dirt and pebbles that she'd managed to scoop up at the Chansey.

The pink Pokemon seemed barely phased.

Another Egg Bomb sent her flying into a rocky ledge, where she laid quite still.

Ceres stared blankly at Cheryl and her Pokemon for a moment.

"Giving up?" Cheryl asked, a cruel grin appearing on her face, "Then, Chansey, use Egg Bomb once more!"

As the attack hit, a white light obscured the battlefield. When the glow faded, it was apparent that the attack had not hit its intended target.

A confused, but utterly unharmed Drifloon floated just in front of Ceres. "Floon?" he asked.

Cheryl laughed, a beautiful but terrible sound. "You'll fight me with a Pokemon who refuses to listen to you? Who wishes to escape? Run along little Drifloon…"

Eye seemed to notice then that he was free to go. He attempted to fly off, only to get hit by a second Pokemon Ceres had apparently released at the same time as him.

"Zu," chuckled Marrow, grinning a sharp-fanged grin at Eye.

The startled Drifloon attempted to attack the Zubat with Gust, but at the last second, Marrow swooped around Chansey, turning sharply, and instead of its intended target, the Gust was sent towards Cheryl instead, distracting her long enough for Marrow to sink her fangs into Chansey.

The Pokemon panicked, wasting a few Egg Bombs by flinging them randomly at where she hoped the Zubat was.

"Zu, zu," Marrow taunted, biting the pink blob again.

"Chansey!" screeched the Pokemon, tossing another Egg Bomb at the Zubat as she attempted to fly away again.

At such close range, the attack couldn't miss, but being so close to the explosion, Chansey was also hit.

The Chansey was still conscious when it hit the ground, and rolled a little ways away. She was not conscious however, after being hit by a few last, panicked Gust attacks from Eye, who was quickly recalled just as the Pokemon fainted.

Before Cheryl knew for sure what had happened, Ceres, had recalled almost all of her Pokemon, and was headed towards the forest's exit, dragging Eye along behind her.

"Budew!" Cheryl shouted, and instantly the forest was alive with very angry looking buds.

"Dew!" they cried simultaneously.

One of the bud-like Pokemon leapt out of the trees surrounding the exit, snatching Eye away from Ceres.

"Since this Drifloon seems so keen on helping you, perhaps it should die with you!" Cheryl shouted.

Ceres stopped suddenly, the faint blue glow returning to the rings around her arms. In her moment of indecision, a wall of Budew blocked the forest's exit.

She turned suddenly, and ran after the Budew that had taken Eye. Many other Budew had joined it, and the groups of bud-like Pokemon were all cackling, and sprinkling orange spores over the frightened and trapped balloon.

Ceres snatched the Drifloon out of the reach of the Budew, and instantly felt her hand go numb where the orange Stun Spores had touched it.

She turned to try to run, but found her path blocked by Budew. Everywhere she looked, the same Pokemon stared back at her with hate-filled eyes.

"Dew!" they all shouted.

"Now, you die!" said Cheryl from somewhere amidst the mass of Budew, "You've nowhere to run!" A gleeful laugh followed these words. "Now Budew, finish her!"

As Stun Spore rained down upon her Ceres quickly recalled Eye, who had been starting to slip from the loose grip of he paralyzed hand, clung tightly to the pokeball, and did something that Cheryl certainly didn't expect. She ran directly through the wall of Budew, Stun Spore beginning to coat her body, newly inflicted scratches glowing faintly purple from the Budews' Poison Point, and out of the forest.

"No!" screeched Cheryl. The hundreds of Budew began to follow her, but, upon reaching the edge of the forest, rebounded as if hitting an invisible wall. After doing so, the hatred faded from their eyes, and they looked around, confused, before scattering, and returning to their homes.

"…No matter," Cheryl finally muttered, "She'll surely die of poisoning…a shame about those poor, confused Pokemon of hers."

* * *

><p>None of the nurses could explain how the girl could have possibly made it to the center. Shallow, but poisonous scratches covered most of her body. None of her Pokemon were in any shape to fight. The paralysis alone should have stopped her long before her combined injuries had.<p>

None of the nurses could explain it, and none of them expected her to survive.


	8. Chapter 7: Reality

Chapter 7: Reality

"It's not possible…"

"That much poison…"

"A Pokemon might have survived that, but a human?"

Two nurses were discussing one of the strangest cases they'd ever stumbled upon. One of them glanced at the bed beside them, where the girl lay, unmoving, with shallow, still-faintly-purple scratches covering her arms, legs, and face. She looked surprisingly serene for someone who had been through what she had.

"She might never wake up…"

"That poor girl…"

"Her poor Pokemon…"

The girl twitched, and one of the nurses looked over at her, seeming faintly surprised.

"She moves a bit sometimes," confided the other nurse, "She never speaks though, and she never moves much more than what you just saw…"

"I can't understand it," the other muttered, shaking her head.

"She seems to be perfectly fine now, except for a bit of poison still in her system…"

"Yet she's not waking up."

"Maybe the poison was more damaging than we initially thought?"

The girl twitched again, this time catching the attention of both nurses.

"That's strange," said the first, but after a minute of the same utter stillness from her patient, she looked away, focusing instead on the red-orange walls of the room.

It was silent for a moment, before the second nurse asked, "What do her Pokemon know about her condition?"

"Her Prinplup is too exhausted to stay awake for long," the first nurse replied, glad to have an easier subject to talk about, "She eats, and moves around a bit, but nothing we've tried to tell her about her trainers really sinks in."

She looked back at the girl before continuing, "Her Drifloon seems utterly panicked. We've had to sedate him several times." She seemed disturbed by the balloon Pokemon's behavior, "We couldn't get through to him at all…it makes me wonder what happened to them…why a bunch of Pokemon would suddenly attack a trainer like that…" She shook her head, "I can't fathom it."

"Perhaps she got too close to a nest?" the second nurse suggested, "and her injuries were a result of a frightened mother Pokemon trying to protect her babies?"

The first nurse shook her head. "I've considered that," she muttered, "but it looks as if she were attacked by every poison type in the forest…" She considered that for a moment. "Roselia, the only poison types in the forest, besides Budew of course, are fairly solitary Pokemon…" Another few seconds passed before she added, "I can't think of any reason for a group of them to join together that way."

The two nurses sighed simultaneously.

The girl twitched again, drawing the nurses' attention once more.

"Now that _is _odd," muttered the first once more.

The girl shuddered once, and then sat straight up, opened her eyes quickly, and looked around hurriedly.

"You're awake!" the first nurse exclaimed.

The girl didn't seem to hear her.

"Can't let them get me," she muttered, shutting her eyes as tightly as she could, and holding her head in her hands.

"Are you alright?" the second nurse asked, concern for the newly awakened patient evident in her tone.

The girl shook her head fretfully. "Get away…" she muttered, her voice shaking, and a strange blue glow appearing around the rings on her arms.

"W-What?" the first nurse stammered.

"GET AWAY!" she screamed. There was a startling flash of blue light, and the two nurses were sent flying into the nearest wall.

Ceres leapt out of bed and began to run, dashing past the two nurses, her footsteps tapping out a hurried rhythm on the tile floors of the Pokemon Center.

She ran past a few confused Chansey, and was almost out the doors before she remembered her Pokemon. She froze for a moment, the terrified tempo of her steps broken. She seemed indecisive, and several thoughts rushed through her head at once.

"Can't…can't leave them," she muttered. Turning quickly, she ran down the hallway opposite the one from which she had come. She ran through the rooms, sending any unfortunate Chansey who got in her way, or startled her flying into nearby walls.

Eventually, she found the five pokeballs that held her Pokemon in a small room near the end of the hallway. She turned to run out the doors once more, and escape.

Then she realized that she was no longer in a small room in the Pokemon Center, but in a large building with gray tiles covering the floor, so unlike the cheerful yellowish tiles that were common in Pokemon centers. She also realized then that she was trapped.

Blocking her path were two people who looked very much like the guards at the Valley Windworks had, and like the two spacemen who had tried to steal Professor Rowan's briefcase had. They sneered at her.

"There's no escaping now," one said with a sneer.

"No way to fight us here," the other jeered, "You're perfectly normal…"

"…And your little friends won't save you this time," the first continued, chuckling.

She screamed, and they flew backwards, hitting the wall behind them with a satisfying thump. She began to run again, glancing around as she did so.

The tiles were a sunny yellow, she realized, not the gray she had seen. The room was a lot smaller than she had thought, and she reached the door in no time. In the place of the spacemen that she had sent flying were too, seemingly unconscious nurses, like the ones working at a Pokemon Center.

Was that where she was? It couldn't be! She kept running, clutching her Pokemon's pokeballs tightly to her as she did so. The floor tiles flashed from yellow to gray and back again. Was that a Chansey she saw, or a hissing, spitting Glameow? She sent it flying in case it was a threat.

She reached the doors to the building, and dashed outside. For a moment she imagined she was safe, in a small, green town, with plants and little houses all around her. The sunlight was warm on her face, and the air was fresh.

Then she saw the reality of the situation. She was in a large, cold city. Cars zoomed past on faraway roads. It was nights, and the bright lights of the buildings, and the screeches of brakes, and the roar of the city were just too much.

She dropped the pokeballs holding her Pokemon, but none of them appeared. She could hear the footsteps of her pursuers, and a moment later, someone grabbed her arm. She screamed again before fainting, and hitting the suddenly soft, grassy ground.

The blue glow around the rings on her arms faded until it was as if it had never been there. A startled Tabitha hovered beside her. Perhaps it was the poison that had caused her to faint again? He, at least, had been listening to the nurses when they'd told him the condition of his trainer.

She looked as if she had been running away from the Pokemon Center. Tabitha looked back to see several unconscious Chansey in the center behind them. She had to have been running for a reason.

"Plup!" Shelly said suddenly, her eyes wide. She shook her head. "Plup!" she said again. Seeing her trainer in such a sorry state was enough to snap her out of her previous trance.

With the help of her other Pokemon, Eye excluded, although the Drifloon was, for some reason, staying close to the rest of the team instead of flying off, Shelly managed to get Ceres away from the center.

Ceres was carried past a small shrub, and finally placed in the shadow of a large, somewhat menacing building. Under normal circumstances, Shelly would have avoided it at all costs, but these were not normal circumstances, and it was the closest shelter.

Now that they were away from the Pokemon Center, Shelly looked back at her trainer, more closely this time. She faintly recalled hearing the nurses at the center say something about poison, but the scratches on Ceres' arms, legs, and face seemed almost completely healed, without a trace of the purple tinge that usually accompanied poison. As she watched, what remained of the scratches faded before her eyes.

"What are you doing here?" asked a loud voice suddenly.

Shelly whirled to face the speaker, who looked almost exactly like the spacemen she had seen earlier when they had taken the Pokemon Professor's briefcase. For a moment she was frightened, but only for a moment. An instant later, her expression turned to one of anger.

This spaceman did not look like he wished them well, and an enemy of her trainer was an enemy of hers.

"I have seen that girl before! In the city of Jubilife!" the spaceman exclaimed. He suddenly pulled off his disguise, revealing that he wasn't actually who Shelly had thought he was, but instead a strange man in a brown overcoat. "She will not get away so easily this time, for I know for sure now that she is most likely a bad guy!" he announced.

Shelly blinked.

She heard a faint sound beside her, like the flutter of wings, and out of the corner of her eye, she noticed Tabitha perch close by.

The Staravia gave the strange overcoat man a smug look that seemed to say, 'remember me'?

The man's mouth fell open, and he turned, and began to run. Tabitha shot after him, and although the man was a surprisingly quick sprinter, he was no match for the Staravia's Quick Attacks.

"This is very not good!" Shelly heard him yell from somewhere far away.

"Him again," she heard a familiar voice say from behind her. She turned around to see Ceres sitting up. The normal Ceres, rather than the terrified creature that the nurses and Chansey had seen, and that she'd caught a brief glimpse of. "A nuisance…" her trainer continued, getting easily and evenly to her feet.

"Prin?" she asked, a bit concerned.

As usual, she was ignored.

"Mallow, Eye, and Soot, return," Ceres ordered. The three Pokemon vanished into their Pokeballs simultaneously in a burst of red light.

Tabitha appeared again suddenly, perching on a tree branch near his trainer's head.

Ceres looked around for a moment, perhaps wondering where she was. Whatever thought had crossed her mind, it was obviously not troubling, and easily dismissed, as her attention was soon upon the building instead.

"Convenient," she muttered, and she strolled inside.

The instant she entered the building, she knew something was amiss. All around, girls and grass type Pokemon were fighting Wurmple, Glameow, Stunky, and Zubat that belonged to various spacemen who seemed to be trying to defend the building.

"Galactic Grunts never give up!" Shouted one, even as an angry-looking Budew defeated his Wurmple.

In an instant, the Budew had fainted as well, and a slightly ruffled-looking Tabitha stood over it warily, as if ready to attack again if it dared move.

Shelly didn't understand his poorly disguised fear. It was just a Budew. She had, after all, been unconscious when the poisonous army belonging to Cheryl, or the one who was not Cheryl, attacked.

Ceres didn't even blink. "Wait for my order," she said calmly.

All around her, the battles continued. She watched them for a moment before finally ordering Tabitha to attack.

Although not a true attacking move, most of the Pokemon around were so weak that Tabitha's Whirlwind swept them aside completely, knocking some out indirectly as they hit chairs and walls.

The trainers were all silent now, and none tried to stop Ceres as she walked up the steps to the next floor, Tabitha and Shelly close behind her.

There were more grass type trainers and so-called 'Galactic Grunts' on the higher floors. As none were very strong, and Ceres cared for neither, she had Soot and Marrow pick them off one by one for experience while their attention was elsewhere.

She hardly noticed Marrow evolving, as she was walking up the final set of steps. Her Pokemon followed her cautiously, as the sounds of a battle raged above.

When they reached the top floor of the building, it was obvious that Ceres' presence was superfluous.

The battle was between two women, only one of which seemed vaguely familiar to Ceres. Once more however, the girl was having difficulty recalling names.

The one who was unfamiliar to her was quite obviously losing. She tugged nervously at the edges of her strange green cloak, and orange hair as she watched her three grass types losing quite horribly to their single opponent.

"All of you, Razor Leaf! We've got to be able to do something," she called desperately to her Pokemon, stomping her boot-clad feet in frustration.

Her opponent's smirk was familiar in some way. Ceres would have been surprised by her uniquely styled purple hair, and strange, skintight outfit if not for that feeling that they'd met many-a-time before.

"Too easy," the victor smirked as a single Night Slash from her skunk-like Pokemon took down all three of her opponent's in one hit. "Ready to leave us alone yet Gardenia?"

"N-Never…my Pokemon may have fainted but-"

"Zubat, Giga Drain," the victor ordered, and a small blue bat, much like Marrow, who seemed to have sat out the entirety of the battle, flew towards Garndenia, fangs extended, aiming for her throat.

Gardenia shrieked, and batted the Zubat away with her hand, running away down the stairs, almost forgetting to recall her Pokemon in her terror. The Zubat followed her, screeching, to ensure that she and her trainers stayed gone.

"Jupiter," Ceres said, finally remembering the familiar woman's name.

For a moment, the woman looked startled, as if she hadn't realized Ceres was there. Then her surprise slowly faded, and she asked, "Ceres?"

"Who else?" Ceres asked dully, staring detachedly at Jupiter.

For a moment, it seemed she would get a response. Then Jupiter shook her head. "No one, of course…as you can see…I've taken care of the threat, if you could call it that, and what little we've been able to glean from the statue…well, we're pretty much finished here."

Her Zubat flew back up the stairs, and hovered beside her and Skuntank.

"Return, both of you," she said, and her Pokemon turned to red light, and vanished into their pokeballs.

For another moment, it was silent.

Finally, Jupiter muttered what sounded like, "Goodbye," and walked away down the stairs. By the time Ceres walked out of the building, and towards the town exit, Jupiter, and all the 'Galactic Grunts' were long gone.

As she was about to leave, she stopped suddenly, as finally noticing something, and turned neatly around, just in time to see the building she had just left go up in flames.


	9. Chapter 8: Recollection

Chapter 8: Recollection

Far away, near a statue on the outskirts of Eterna City, a man watched as smoke from an explosion drifted into the air. He pocketed one of the two devices he held, and glanced down at the other.

It was a small, black remote of some sort, with a teardrop-shaped dial on one side that seemed to be pointing almost directly to the left of the device. He was still for a moment, before finally turning the dial a bit to the right.

"Sir?" a voice asked, breaking him out of his thoughts.

"Your mission is complete here, is it not?" he asked without turning, slight irritation in his voice at the interruption.

"Well…yes, but…" Jupiter trailed off.

After a few seconds of silence, Cyrus prompted her again, "Yes?"

"About Ceres, sir," she added, taking a few steps forward to stand behind him, "she…well…I-I definitely know now that you were correct about her."

"You doubted me before?"

"No, that's not it at all!" Jupiter assured him, trying to keep panic out of her voice, "I…just meant to report that…everything is still going well."

"That is where you are incorrect, Commander Jupiter," Cyrus muttered, sounding irritated again.

Jupiter couldn't hide her surprise at this. "W-What?" she stammered.

"Not to worry," Cyrus said, "The device was set at minimum power. I should have known that troublesome brat would−" He paused to adjust his tone, as he was starting to sound quite angry. "She will not be a problem anymore," he added finally, this time giving no indication of his anger.

"Then−"

"You are dismissed," he said.

Jupiter nodded without argument, and left quickly.

For a while, all was silent.

Then, Cyrus spoke, mumbling to himself: "Even at minimum power…to resist that device…"

* * *

><p>After the building in Eterna had exploded, Ceres left the city quite quickly, before the situation spiraled out of control. She ran south, towards a famous bicycle path in Sinnoh.<p>

"W-Wait!" a startled gatekeeper called as she ran onto Cycling Road without a bike to speak of, "Come back! It's dangerous to−" He broke off when he realized that the girl was much too far away by now to hear him.

Ceres didn't care to heed his warning in the least. It was easy to avoid the bicycles on the path. Each predictably swerved before hitting her, and whether or not they hit other bicycles in the process of doing so was no concern of hers.

It didn't take long, running downhill, to reach the next gate. Another very confused gatekeeper watched as she ran right past him, probably wondering how she'd ever been allowed onto Cycling Road without a bike in the first place.

She stopped after she left the gateway, suddenly realizing that she was out of breath after running such a long way. She leaned against a tree, thinking numbly of her exhaustion as she struggled to catch her breath.

Out of the corner of her eye, Ceres saw a purple and cream-colored creature wander out from behind a nearby shrub. It noticed her rather quickly, and began to walk towards her, an expression of curiosity on its face.

Ceres tried to quiet her breathing a bit, knowing that it would be a bad idea to startle the creature. Her hand moved very slowly to the pouch that carried the minimized pokeballs of her five Pokemon, and one still-empty one. Thankfully she'd snatched it up along with her pokeballs as she left the Eterna Pokemon Center. She didn't remember doing so, but then, she didn't remember any of it.

Pushing all thoughts of her lack of memories out of her mind, she focused on the little creature drawing ever closer to her.

It was a tiny, mostly purple, skunk-like creature, with large, inquisitive eyes, and twitchy little cream-colored whiskers. She had managed to free the last empty pokeball from the pouch, and was about to throw it, when a shout distracted her, and startled the little purple skunk nearby.

"You!" cried a somewhat familiar voice.

She quickly flicked the pokeball in the direction of the skunk, before it had the chance to attack with any poisonous gasses, and turned to face the speaker, her expression uninterested.

"You're the one who stole Professor Rowan's briefcase, and hurt Roseanne!" It was the boy whom she had met at Sandgem Town. He was glaring at her, and she was unsure what he was really expecting. An apology perhaps? An explanation?

She gave him neither, and a dull minute passed. It would have been entirely silent if not for Ceres still trying to catch her breath, and a soft 'click' which neither Ceres nor Lucas seemed to pay any attention to.

"Yes," Ceres stated finally. "And?" She added after another, shorter pause.

"And? And, you better apologize! And…turn yourself in to the police or something!" Lucas answered immediately.

Ceres was silent for a couple more seconds, waiting for her breathing to normalize. Then she picked up the pokeball on the ground behind her, stood up straight, and began to walk away.

It took Lucas a moment to understand what had just happened. Then he started after her, waving his arms in an exaggerated fashion, exclaiming, "You can't just walk away and not saying anything!" He sounded more astounded than angry at this point.

"Stop following me," Ceres replied.

"Or what?" Lucas challenged, glaring again.

In an instant Shelly's pokeball was in Ceres' hand, and a moment later the Prinplup was at her side, looking ready for a fight.

Lucas smirked. "I see how it is…If I win, you have to turn yourself in to the police! Go, Blaze!"

As soon as the monkey-like Pokemon appeared, it was clear that he had evolved. He was taller for one thing, but that wasn't the most noticeable difference.

Blaze's skin tone had darkened somewhat, although his fur was the same orange it had always been. He had a tail now, with a flame at the end of it. Over his eyes was a mask-like blue marking, and around his neck was a spiky white ruff.

Other than some tiny, rather insignificant details he hadn't changed much besides that. As soon as he was out of his pokeball he began to complain to Lucas about being stuck in his pokeball all day. He was still small enough to ride on his trainer's shoulders, although not quite as easily as before he had evolved.

"I'm sorry Blaze, but we talked about this before," Lucas mumbled, "You're too heavy to- wait, where is she going?"

He ran off then, chasing after Ceres, who was rather far ahead by now, leaving a rather confused Monferno behind him.

Blaze kept shouting after him for a moment, but when he noticed who his trainer was running after, and the Pokemon beside her, he ran as fast as he could to catch up.

Seeing as Ceres and Shelly were walking, and Blaze and Lucas were running, it didn't take the boy and his Monferno long to catch up.

"Wait….wait up a second," Lucas mumbled, sounding tired.

As usual, he was ignored, and Ceres and Shelly walked into a cave up ahead without him.

Blaze had a lot more stamina than his trainer, and thus wasn't tired in the least. He grinned as the exhausted Lucas for a moment before running into the cave after Ceres and Shelly.

Lucas was about to stumble after his Pokemon and Ceres when he realized just where he was. He peered into the darkness of the cave, seeing only the glow of Blaze's tail as the Monferno ran around a faraway corner.

"No! Blaze, come back, that's Mount Coronet! You can't−" he stopped shouting when he realized that there was no way his Monferno would hear him from so far away.

Meanwhile, to Blaze, his trainer's words were nothing more than a faint echo. The Monferno was too busy following Ceres and Shelly to pay them any mind anyway.

He soon caught up to them, and immediately began questioning Shelly, asking how on earth she could listen to a trainer who's a thief, and who hurt innocent people.

Shelly did her best to ignore the irritating Monferno and continue on, just like her trainer, but little by little, she began to get annoyed. Finally, she turned around and snapped at him, asking if he knew just how annoying he could be.

Blaze repeated his previous questions.

Ceres took what she needed, Shelly told him. That girl was just being mean and getting in the way, she continued. She concluded by snapping at him that there was nothing wrong with what her trainer did, and he should just leave them alone and go away.

Did she really believe that, he asked her, and she nodded sharply in reply.

The rest of the walk was silent.

Finally, Ceres stopped walking, seemingly in the middle of nowhere, and sat down, as if waiting for something. Shelly followed suit. Blaze glared at the both of them, and said something huffily about not sitting around doing nothing, and finding his trainer, who was actually a good person, unlike Ceres.

Shelly was about to spit a weak Bubblebeam at him, but a sharp glance from Ceres made her reconsider, and stay sitting where she was.

"Patience," Ceres said, sitting utterly still, unblinking.

Blaze sneered at Shelly asking if she was really just going to sit and do nothing. She didn't reply. His taunts continued until her got bored. He wandered off for a while.

Ceres still didn't move. A strange thought occurred to her suddenly.

_She didn't get away._

Something deep inside her stirred slightly, but she hardly noticed, and she did not care.

_She didn't get away._

The thought was starting to disturb her. She twitched slightly.

She didn't get away

Ceres got to her feet quickly, startling Shelly, and began to pace. The Prinplup looked worriedly at her.

_She didn't get away. She didn't get away. She didn't get away._

The same thought, over and over. She nearly stumbled, but managed to right herself at the last second, and continue pacing.

_She didn't get away. She didn't get away. She didn't get away._

She wasn't sure she could take much more of that thought. Her calm slowly slipped away until she was nothing. She was nothing. She was nothing.

_She didn't get away._

She was going to scream!

_She didn't get away. She didn't get away. She didn't get away. She didn't get away−_

"Ceres," someone said calmly.

Calm washed over her, and she stopped pacing. Her expression, previously frantic, faded to normal. She looked serenely over at the speaker and blinked slowly, as if coming out of a trance.

"Master Cyrus," she said, and if she were anyone else, she would have smiled, sounded happy in some way, or grateful perhaps, but she was not anyone else, she knew. She Galactic Commander Ceres, her expression was blank, and her tone, lifeless.

He was silent for a moment before looking over at something behind her.

She did not turn to so much glance at the Monferno who chose then to come skittering back through the mountain.

"Blaze, wait up," a nervous, shaky voice called from behind the fire monkey.

Lucas ran out of the darkness, to stand beside his Monferno, wheezing again, having run all through the mountain.

"You shouldn't…run off like that…" he managed to say between breaths, "Took me…forever to…find you."

"Mon…ferno…" Blaze mumbled, seeming concerned, and sorry that he had left Lucas all the way at the cave's entrance.

"You can't just run ahead," Lucas continued, "This place is−"

"Mount Coronet," Cyrus finished. It was then that Lucas noticed that he and Blaze were not alone.

"This is sacred ground," Ceres said, turning quickly to face Lucas, her voice soft and childlike suddenly.

"Ceres is right," Cyrus said to Lucas, as if he were scolding a small child, "You shouldn't be running around here."

"I-I'm sorry sir," Lucas stammered, "But she's−"

"Come along," Cyrus ordered, beginning to walk away. Ceres followed wordlessly, Shelly at her side.

Lucas and Blaze followed Ceres, Lucas hoping to explain everything later, and Blaze not wanting to get anymore lost than he already was.

After a long walk through the remainder of the dark cave, a faint light appeared ahead of them, getting brighter as they got closer. It soon became apparent that it was the way out of the mountain. Before long, they left the mountain entirely.

"Thanks for guiding us out of there sir…I'm sorry, I didn't know it was sacred or anything…" Lucas mumbled. Her looked up to see Cyrus watching him silently.

"I'm really sorry," the boy muttered again.

"Very well," Cyrus said, and Lucas let out a sigh of relief. Then, not looking away from the boy for a second, he added, "Ceres, kill them both."


	10. Chapter 9: Uncertainty

Chapter 9:

Ceres nodded sharply, unmindful of the sudden terror of Lucas and his Pokemon.

"Shelly," she ordered, "Bubblebeam."

Her Prinplup turned her head towards Ceres a bit, giving her a strange look, sure that her trainer wasn't serious. Her gawk was met with nothing but impartial seriousness.

"Plup!" she protested.

Lucas couldn't understand what Shelly was saying at all, but took advantage of the Pokemon's seeming unwillingness to attack by turning around and dashing into Mount Coronet, his footsteps loud and disruptive against the relative silence of the mountainside cave.

Cyrus stared after him for a moment, before saying quietly, "Ceres…he is disrupting the peace of the mountain."

"Mount Coronet is a sacred place…" Ceres replied softly again. A dazed look appeared suddenly in her eyes, and then vanished as quickly as it had appeared. She ran quietly after Lucas, careful not to disturb so much as a pebble as she darted through the cave.

Shelly watched her leave for a moment, and then ran after her, not nearly as gracefully, nor as carefully.

Ceres didn't notice. She was utterly absorbed with finding Lucas, and stopping the atrocious disruption of the mountain's usual serenity.

Lucas' footsteps abruptly stopped, and in the faint glow of his Monferno's tail, it was obvious why. He had somehow come to a dead end. He spun around quickly, hoping to take another route, but found his path blocked by the faint silhouette of the strange girl he had met oh-so-long ago in Sandgem.

He took a fraction of a step backwards, the heel of his shoe pressing against the cold, stone wall behind him. He had nowhere to run now.

Blaze, also noticing that he had been cornered, began to prepare for a fight. Their situation looked rather bleak however, as his opponent was a water type. He considered the alternatives. Going with the girl would certainly end in their death.

Reasonably, there were no options.

"Monferno!" he shouted, challenging the Prinplup who had arrived alongside the girl.

The water type Pokemon looked doubtful, and glanced up at her trainer for a moment, before looking at Lucas, and finally back at Blaze. "Plup," she muttered, conflicted.

"Blaze, use Mach Punch!" Lucas ordered suddenly, his voice rather shrill with fear.

Blaze began to ready his attack, but was stopped by an almost immediate cry from Ceres. "No!" she shouted sharply, the single word resounding repeatedly throughout the no-longer-silent mountain.

"There should not be any fighting here," Ceres said softly, "This is a place of peace. It should always be at peace. It _will _always be at peace."

The last, faint echo of her previous cry resonated pitifully.

Lucas didn't hesitate for an instant. "Blaze, use the−"

A sudden, blinding white light stunned him momentarily, and when it had faded, he seemed less sure of his previous orders. In fact, he was outright contradicting himself.

"Blaze, don't attack!" he shouted urgently, and in the faint orange glow of the fire type's tail, his expression looked confused. "We have to stay here!" he said, and then he shook his head, "We have to go with her!" he pointed at Ceres. He then looked baffled. "We have to….we have to…" he trailed off.

His Pokemon shot him a bemused glare. What was he up to? What was he thinking? They couldn't just give up! He proceeded to tell his trainer so, but like most humans; Lucas understood not a word of what his Pokemon was saying.

"We should…go with her…" Lucas said, finally seeming to decide that that was the correct answer.

Ceres nodded, and began to walk away, Shelly at her side, and Lucas following obediently behind. Blaze just stood there, watching them, baffled as to what had happened. He ran after them, trying in vain to change his trainer's mind. He screeched at the boy to no avail. Lucas refused to listen.

Soon they had reached the cave's exit once more. Cyrus was waiting for them, his expression perfectly composed, easily concealing his true impatience.

"Everything's calm again," Ceres stated quietly.

Lucas nodded with a strange enthusiasm, and then, too late, Blaze realized why. Hovering just inside the cave, utterly silent except for the slight fluttering of wings, was a Golbat. The bat Pokemon was watching Lucas closely, and every time their eyes met, the boy seemed a bit more dazed.

Blaze turned to his trainer, trying frantically to explain. Not a single one of his words seemed to reach Lucas' ears. The boy looked contently into the eyes of the Golbat, not realizing the danger he was in.

"Careful now Monferno," Cyrus interrupted, "You'll disturb the mountain."

"Yeah Blaze," Lucas mumbled dreamily, "Quiet…it's so peaceful here."

Blaze kept shouting disbelievingly. It was all the Golbat's fault! Lucas had to realize that! They had to get away!

Suddenly, unthinkingly, the fire type lunged unthinkingly at the bat Pokemon, aiming a Mach Punch at one of its wings. The attack barely grazed it. Blaze aimed another Mach Punch at the Golbat's face. The attack collided with another wing instead, doing no visible damage.

"Shelly," Ceres muttered, "he's hurting Marrow." She paused to let her words sink in. "He's hurting your friend Shelly."

The Prinplup glared at Blaze.

"He should be punished for hurting your friend Shelly," Ceres continued, "He's hurting her Shelly."

Shelly looked doubtfully at Marrow, whose gaze had not wavered from Lucas' for an instant. Just then however, Blaze gave up on attacking with Mach Punch, and spat an Ember at the bat Pokemon. The Golbat wobbled visibly in flight, her wing smoking a bit where the tiny flame had burnt it. Sensing an advantage, the Monferno aimed another Mach Punch at her, aiming to knock her out of the air.

"He hurt her Shelly, and she's going to get hurt again," Ceres whispered.

Just as Blaze's attack landed, a stream of bubbles hit him, sending him flying away from his target, who recovered from the weakened attack, and continued to stare into Lucas' eyes.

Blaze got weakly to his feet and called to Lucas one last time, trying to snap his trainer out of confusion. His words had no effect on Lucas, and finally the exhausted Monferno, the tip of his tail barely flaming now, ran away into Mount Coronet.

Lucas didn't notice, and continued staring distantly into Marrow's eyes.

Ceres walked over to him, standing directly between him and Marrow. Before the Confuse Ray could fade, and before the boy could finally snap out of confusion, Ceres pushed him lightly, and he toppled off the ledge on which they were standing, falling a long way before he finally hit the water with a rather loud splash.

Ceres stood there for a moment, staring at the rushing river below, and then turned to face Cyrus.

"He won't disturb the sacred mountain anymore," she said softly.

Cyrus hid the faintest of smiles. "Very good Commander Ceres. Now, we must speak of your next assignment…"

Shelly watched as the man led her trainer away. Her mind failed to comprehend what had just happened.

She considered for a moment that perhaps the boy would be okay, and Ceres knew that he would, but looking down at the river, she doubted it.

She wondered if Marrow's injury had caused Ceres to act in such a way. Pokemon hurt other Pokemon all the time though, and a Pokemon Center healed them, and nobody stayed hurt for long. Not like the trainer who Ceres had pushed into the river likely would.

Then she looked back at the mountain, and it made sense. Ceres had said that this was a sacred place. The trainer had been disturbing a holy place. Ceres couldn't allow that, could she? That couldn't be forgiven.

Shelly shook her head, and looked in awe at the mountain in front of her. She understood now.

Ceres returned soon. She silently recalled Marrow into her pokeball, and began to walk away from the mountain. Shelly followed as quietly as she could, careful now in her new revelation.


	11. Chapter 10: Wither

Chapter 10: Wither

It was much later. They were just outside a large city, and although the sun had begun to set, Ceres had insisted on staying outside and training.

Shelly was, at the moment, trying to defeat a particularly stubborn Pokemon that looked a lot like a Bidoof. It was large and rodent-like, with large, semi-focused eyes. As she watched it warily, its buckteeth chattered, and it slapped its large tail against the ground.

Shelly let out a frustrated sigh, and attacked the creature with Bubblebeam. The rodent-like Pokemon didn't seem effected by the attack at all. It stared at her blankly for a moment, before wandering towards her, and attempting to Headbutt her. It didn't even seem disappointed when she jumped easily out of the way.

Shelly wondered aloud why her attacks were having such little effect. She got no reply, and continued attacking the rodent, who of course didn't even seem to notice.

Her ineffective onslaught was interrupted by a shrill chirping giggle.

She spun around, immediately demanding to know what was so funny.

Her angry tone was met with amused indifference by the observer of her rather hopeless battle. Tabitha replied something about the Pokemon she was attacking being a water type, and began his shrill chirp-laughing again.

Shelly grumbled something unintelligibly in reply, immediately turning to attack the rodent with Peck. She meant to only attack the creature once, but ended up pecking it a total of four times.

The rodent chattered angrily at her, upset at the sudden change in its opponent's tactics. It scrambled away as quickly as its stubby legs could carry it. Shelly watched it go, wondering what had just happened.

"I see your Prinplup isn't having much luck fighting Bibarel with Bubblebeam and Fury Attack"

Shelly jumped, not having noticed a human so nearby. She turned to face the speaker, and saw Ceres beside an unfamiliar girl. Her trainer didn't reply.

The girl seemed a bit puzzled at her silence, but spoke again. "Maybe if you could beat me in a Pokemon battle. I- my Pokemon could show her a technique that would be better against water types…"

Ceres was silent for a while longer, and Shelly wasn't even sure if her trainer was considering the idea. She, on the other hand, was definitely up for it. Still, she waited for her trainer's decision.

Finally, the girl looked doubtful. "It is a bit late," she muttered, "Maybe I should be going home…"

"Plup!" Shelly cried out suddenly, not about to let the opportunity go to waste.

"Well…your Prinplup seems to think it'd be fun," the girl noticed.

Ceres glanced down at Shelly, and for a moment, Shelly thought that her trainer was angry with her. Then Ceres nodded, and the Prinplup breathed a quiet sigh of relief.

Tabitha laughed his chirpy laugh again, but Shelly ignored him entirely.

"Alright then!" the girl said enthusiastically. She began to glow suddenly, and grow shorter. In an instant, she was only about a foot tall, and no longer looked to be human. The glow around her faded, and where the girl had stood before was what looked to be a grass-type Pokemon.

"Roselia!" she crowed, leaping suddenly at Shelly. The Prinplup tried to dodge her attack, but ended up tripping over something. She landed painfully on her beak.

"Plup…" she moaned.

"Get up," Ceres ordered.

Shelly hesitated a moment, rubbing her sore beak miserably.

"Now!" Ceres shouted, and the startled Prinplup scrambled quickly to her feet, wrenching her toes free of the vines that had tripped her just as more or the plants shot out of the ground and wrapped around the space where she been only a moment ago. She took a step back, and was tripped up by yet another vine.

The grass type spoke again, and this time her words were Pokemon, and English. "The guardian of the flowers gave this ability to me," she said, "I can be a human now, if I want, or Roselia."

She gave a high-pitched giggle, and more vines shot towards Shelly.

The Prinplup slashed away the vines with Metal Claw, but more quickly took their place.

"The heavier the foe, the more damage Grass Knot does!" The Roselia sang.

"Plup!" Shelly glared at the grass type, rather offended. Her momentary distraction allowed several vines to wrap around her.

"I don't want to hurt your Prinplup 'Commander'," the grass type Pokemon said, smiling slightly as the vines around Shelly tightened, and the Prinplup winced, "but the guardian says she heard about you…and you're going to do something bad. Very bad. So we have to stop you."

Shelly seemed to be focused of something near the Roselia. Ceres didn't follow her gaze, instead choosing to stare silently at the Pokemon herself.

"Make your choice," the Roselia sang, "One wrong move and it's all over for your Prinplup−"

The grass type was tugged suddenly and violently to the side by a thin vine that had wrapped around her leg while she was focused on Ceres.

Shelly smirked, and sharpened the edges of her fins with Metal Claw, slicing somewhat easily through the vines binding her.

"You learn quick," the Roselia said, slipping free of the vine and running towards Shelly. She leapt easily over the thin vines that the Prinplup managed to summon.

"You might have been able to surprise me, but there's no way that'll work again," the Roselia muttered as she ran.

Shelly slashed at the Roselia with a Metal Claw when the grass type drew close, but of course she easily jumped out of the way. She sent another few vines towards Shelly, who barely had time to prepare another Metal Claw and hack them away.

"You're gonna slip up sometime," the Roselia said, "You're already getting tired."

Shelly hadn't notice before the grass type had mentioned it, but she was indeed tiring. Her wings ached from the effort of slashing away the Grass Knot attacks. Nevertheless, she was determined to keep fighting.

Another few Grass Knots had her struggling to form a single Metal Claw, failing, and leaping hurriedly out of the way of the attack at the last second. She was too slow, however, to avoid one of the vines, which wrapped around her ankle, and dragged her to the ground.

"Try to escape this," challenged the Roselia.

"Get up," Ceres muttered.

Shelly wriggled a bit, trying to free her leg from the vine. She tried to push herself to her feet with her flippers, but only got about an eighth of the way up before her strength failed her, and she fell.

The Roselia giggled, "You're all tuckered out…poor Prinplup."

The grass type looked away from Shelly for a moment, noticing a few more feeble vines trying to ensnare her.

She hopped out of the reach of each one happily, as if the battle were a game to her. "Not gonna catch me−"

"Wing Attack," Ceres called.

Tabitha had been slowly flying closer to the grass type while her attention was elsewhere. She noticed then of course, but not in time to avoid the Staravia's attack.

Tabitha slapped Roselia into the air with one wing.

"Air Cutter," Ceres ordered.

For a moment Tabitha was confused. He didn't know that move.

Then Marrow flew towards the still-airborne Roselia, sending quick, deadly winds her way, tossing the grass type one way, stopping her as if she had hit an invisible wall, and then tossing her to the ground. She hit the earth with a thump, and lay still for a moment, before struggling to her feet.

"I'll- I'll tell the guardian what you've−" she broke off suddenly, a fit of coughing interrupting her words.

Ceres and her Pokemon remained still, the latter because they had received no further orders, the former because she wished to hear what the Roselia had to say.

"−what you've done," the Roselia said, her voice shaky and weak, "She'll−" she coughed again, "she'll kill you!" She began coughing again. "I'll…tell her…" The grass type drew a wheezy breath, and then stumbled and fell. She did not rise again.

Ceres stared silently at the dead Roselia for a few moments, and then glanced towards Shelly. The Prinplup struggled feebly for a moment against the Roselia's remaining Grass Knot. Then the vine shriveled and gave up its grip on her ankle, and sank back into the earth.

Ecstatic at her freedom, the Prinplup gathered just enough energy to stumble to her feet before looking dizzy, and falling again.

A beam of red light caught her before she could hit the ground, and Shelly vanished into her pokeball.

"We're leaving," Ceres said suddenly, looking up at the night sky. Sometime during the battle with the Roselia, the sun had set entirely. Although she was sure that Marrow could still train during the night, the thought of training in almost complete darkness repelled her.

She began to walk towards the faint light of the next city.

Tabitha and Marrow followed her without hesitation, partially out of respect for their trainer, and partially because they were more than eager to leave the Roselia's corpse behind them.

Neither questioned the ethics of what they had just done. After all, the grass type had been trying to kill them as well. That was the way their world worked in the wild as well. Kill or be killed.

Of course, Tabitha knew nothing of Lucas. Marrow simply didn't care. What was one human more or less?

The light of the city grew larger and brighter as they grew closer. The distance between where they had been training and their destination wasn't a particularly long one, but each was tired by the time they stepped through the city's gate.

Suddenly, a fluffy, brown bunny-like Pokemon hopped into Ceres' arms.

For a moment all was silent, outside of the noises of the city, which were surprisingly few. Then a rather frantic-looking girl ran up to them, nearly tripping over her frilly pink dress as she did so.

"Oh, thank you!" she said, "thank you for catching my Buneary!"

Ceres stared at her silently in reply.

Buneary hopped out of Ceres' arms suddenly, landing on the head of the pink-clad girl who was apparently its trainer. She snatched the little brown bunny off of her head, and glared at it. "Baby Buneary, you know better than to run off…"

The rabbit's ears drooped slightly, but the girl's attention was once more on Ceres. "I work at the Contest Hall a little ways north of here. It's a huge building, and it makes up about a sixth of Hearthome. It's difficult to miss. Why don't you drop by some time, and join us for a different kind of fun?"

She ran off then, and as quickly as the Buneary and her trainer had appeared, they were gone.

Ceres stared after the strange girl for a moment, and then turned to address her Pokemon, "We have to find the Pokemon Center."

Tabitha and Marrow both nodded, and immediately flew off to find the building with the red roof. It didn't take long for them to report back.

It was a short walk to the Pokemon Center, and Ceres recalled her Pokemon when she got there. After handing four pokeballs to the nurse at the counter, she went to sit down in at a table in the corner of the center.

She looked down at the fifth pokeball. The one that she hadn't given to the nurse, as the Pokemon inside hadn't had a chance to battle yet.

"Toxious," she decided.

* * *

><p>The route west of Hearthome was utterly silent. Not a Pokemon was stirring, not even a Kricketot, despite the fact that they were usually very active at night.<p>

All were huddled in their homes, each terrified of something they could not name for a reason that they could not explain.

In the center of the route lay the body of a Roselia, her leaves tattered and torn, blood seeping from cuts all over her body. Her unseeing eyes stared up at the cloudy night sky above.

Then the earth around her came to live. The grass began to twitch and sway, although there was no breeze. Each flower of the route, previously closed to the cold night, opened its petals to stare at the cloudy sky.

Tiny, sharp vines made their way out of the ground at began sewing up each wound on the Roselia's soft, green skin.

Tiny flowers, glowing like the moon, began to sprout around the grass type's body. One by one, their glow faded, to reappear in the eyes of the no-longer-quite-as-dead Pokemon.

Roselia got slowly and unsteadily to her feet. As her spirit returned to her body, her actions became quicker, and more agile, until her soul had gathered once more into her body.

She smiled slightly, a smile devoid of happiness. "Thank you guardian," she said softly, "I will not fail you again."

She walked gracefully, almost gliding across the grass, and lay down beneath a sweet-smelling tree. In the morning, she told herself with another joyless smile, the Galactic Commander would die.


	12. Chapter 11: Relative Unimportence

Chapter 11: Relative Unimportance

Ceres awoke with a start in the middle of the night to almost complete darkness, except for the faintest blue glow that seemed to be emanating from somewhere nearby. For a moment she was too terrified to do anything more but sit, and stare into the dark all around her. She was too frightened even to berate herself for fearing what was surely only a figment of her imagination.

At some point, somewhere, she had fallen asleep. She had dreamt of the girl again, the girl from her previous dreams. The dreams she could never seem to remember clearly, except at times like this.

The girl had run into a small room at the end of the hallway, and been trapped by two of the Galactic Grunts.

There was no escaping, they had told her. No way to fight, and no one to save her. She had felt the girl's fear as if it were her own. Somehow, she had known that the words that the Grunts spoke were true.

"Come along now," one of them had muttered.

"And don't try to give us any trouble," the other had growled, "You won't win, and you won't get away."

As they walked back down the hallway, Ceres had realized that everything seemed familiar, as if she had seen the place before. It hadn't been a nice familiarity.

She shouldn't have come back.

The thought had shocked her, as it was hers, but had not seemed to be.

The girl had suddenly asked the Grunts a question, that for a moment, Ceres couldn't recall. Then she remembered. It had been "Where are you taking me?"

"To the boss of course," one of the Grunts had replied with a grin, "He'll be very pleased to hear that we've finally caught you."

Ceres had awoken then.

Moments later, her terror faded, to be replaced by calm, as little by little she managed to convince herself that it was ridiculous to be afraid of something that had never happened. By the time she had managed to dispel all her fears, it was dark all around her.

The mysterious blue light that had been present when she had awoken was gone.

She thought nothing of it, as she was more focused on figuring out where she was. She was still not fully awake, and her memories and thoughts were rather muddled from sleep.

It took her a few minutes to fully remember where she was.

Immediately after her Pokemon had been healed at the Pokemon Center, Ceres had left, despite the local nurses' insisting that she stay inside, because of the late hour. It had been cold, and it still was, but she hadn't cared, and she still didn't.

She had wandered the streets of Hearthome for some time, letting Eye and Marrow out of their pokeballs, wary of danger after running into the strange Roselia.

Hearthome City had been well lit by the lampposts lining every street. Now she could see nothing but darkness any way she looked.

She had remembered walking up to a gate, where a strange man had shouted something about how adorable her Drifloon was, and had asked if she wanted to go on a stroll with it. She hadn't answered, but he'd insisted that she stroll with Eye, and dragged her into a park-like area, with lampposts similar to Hearthome here and there. He hadn't seemed to notice Marrow at all.

Soon the three of them were strolling through the nearly empty park, Eye picking up a few feathers, a strange pink fluff, and even a mustache-like object along the way. Ceres had managed to carefully scale a rocky wall that probably wasn't part of the park, with Eye and Marrow following closely behind.

They had walked for a while longer in the short grass atop the wall, until the lights of the park behind them had faded, and there was only darkness. Ceres had sat down then, tired out from the long walk, and had fallen asleep.

She was no longer asleep, and had no desire to sleep again, in case the dreams of the girl and the Galactic Grunts and the horrible, familiar building returned. She wasn't about to start wandering around atop a wall in the middle of the night, so she merely sat there, doing absolutely nothing but trying her best to stay awake.

Despite her best efforts however, Ceres found herself falling asleep again. She vainly struggled to remain awake, but such struggles were futile. Her tired eyes shut, and she found herself dreaming again.

The girl and the Grunts stepped onto a glowing, circular tile on the floor, and vanished one by one. They reappeared in a much different room, and kept walking.

It was clear that the girl knew exactly where they were going, and her expression darkened as they drew closer to their destination. As another of the yellow tiles came into view, she stopped suddenly.

"You know this place pretty well for an outsider," one of the Grunts remarked with a smirk.

"Then again," the other Grunt said, "you've been here quite a few times. Bet you aren't so glad that you came back now, are you?" He paused, and looked around, and it was evident by his expression that he didn't like what he saw.

"Even a real psychic type couldn't escape this place," the first Grunt said rather nervously, "Not with all the dark types around here…somewhere." He shuddered.

"Let's just get going," the second Grunt muttered.

The girl didn't move.

"Are you going to keep walking, or are we going to have to make you?" the first Grunt mumbled, focusing on the girl for a few seconds at a time, and casting darting glances around the hallway when his attention wasn't on her.

"Come on," the second Grunt said loudly, grabbing the girl's arm, and starting to drag her towards the yellow tile.

After a moment, she began to walk over her own accord, and the Grunt's grip on her arm loosened. She slowed a bit as they neared the tile, but her captors didn't notice, as they'd stopped almost entirely, their attention on the abundant shadows of the room, rather than on her.

The girl took the opportunity to wrench her arm free of the second Grunt's grip, and run down the hallway as fast at she could, headed towards a yellow tile nearby the one that had brought them to the room.

She heard the shouts of her former captors as they realized what had happened, and their footsteps as they ran to chase her. Her feet reached the tile before they Grunts caught her, and she vanished.

Instead of another room of the building, Ceres saw a bright light. She blinked a few times, and then looked away, realizing that she had been staring straight at the sun. She realized that her heart was racing, and she was exhausted, as if she had been the girl running from the Galactic Grunts, rather than herself, asleep in the soft grass on a ledge overlooking the park.

Ceres failed to notice the blue glow about her, as it paled in comparison to the bright light of the sun. It vanished soon anyway, and she found herself forgetting all about the dream as she noticed the sleeping forms of Eye and Marrow beside her. She quickly found their pokeballs and recalled them, as they'd be no use to her asleep.

It was easier getting down from the wall than it was getting up. In broad daylight she noticed a few small platforms nearby that helped her get back down to the park without too much climbing.

It seemed that the strange man who'd seemed so interested in Eye had fallen asleep at his post. He said nothing as she walked by the gate that he was slumped against, and she thought she heard him snoring faintly. She was rather glad for this, as his apparent obsession with her Drifloon the night before had struck her as slightly disturbing.

She walked on without a second thought, soon reaching Hearthome, which was much different in the daytime than at night. Groups of people walked along the sidewalks, chattering incessantly about every insignificant thought that came to mind. People laughed and shouted, and ran and made all sorts of noise.

Ceres much preferred the city at nighttime, and was eager to leave now that all the town's inhabitants were awake.

It didn't take her long at all to reach one of the gates leading out of the city. She left without looking back, which was good, for if she'd been focused on the city behind her, she wouldn't have noticed the strange child who seemed to be trying to sneak up to her, hiding in plain sight behind bushes and trees that were much to short or thin to conceal him.

She watched him silently, wondering why he seemed so familiar, until he jumped out from a nearby bush, shouting something about stealth and some guy called 'Officer Looker'.

After a moment of thought, she remembered him. It was the blond boy whose Pokemon Shelly and Tabitha had easily defeated near Jubilife.

She stared at him for a moment, noting that he seemed to be waiting for her to say something. Then an impatient look appeared on his face.

"I'm tired of waiting," he said suddenly and loudly, "Go, Starly, use Wing Attack."

"Soot, Rock Throw," Ceres said, after snatching the Geodude's pokeball quickly out of the pouch that held it.

Soot appeared just in time to stop the Starly's attack from hitting Ceres. She then tore a chunk of earth out of the ground nearby, and flung it at the Starly. The little bird was nearly crushed under the mound of compacted dirt before its trainer recalled it.

Soot was recalled as soon moments after the Starly, and replaced with Tabitha. The Staravia looked a bit confused for a moment, but as the impatient blond boy sent out his next Pokemon, a Buizel, he realized that he was in a battle.

"Quick Attack," the two Pokemon's trainers ordered simultaneously.

Tabitha easily out sped the little water weasel that was his opponent, and his Quick Attack sent the little orange creature tumbling back towards its trainer. The Buizel still seemed quite able to fight, and it shot towards Tabitha, slamming into his wing, and sending him plummeting towards the ground.

With a few angry chirps, Tabitha spun in midair, and slapped the Buizel with his unhurt wing. The attack didn't have quite as much force as he'd hoped, but it'd obviously stung.

His opponent hissed at him as he landed lightly on his feet. It leapt at him suddenly, attacking without orders from its trainer, with a Pursuit that was likely to be less effective than other attacks could have been.

Tabitha waited for Ceres' orders, but began to worry as his opponent drew close, and she still hadn't said a word. Just as the water type was about to collide with him, he heard her hurried orders, and sent the little weasel flying with a powerful Wing Attack.

"Go Ponyta- Ugh, no time for that, Grotle, I choose you instead," Ceres' challenger shouted. A fire-type horse had been about to form, but the red light forming it shrunk and vanished with its trainer's new orders, and another red light released a large turtle with bushes growing on its back.

The trainer's hesitation was enough for Tabitha to get a Quick Attack in, and follow up with a Wing Attack. By the time the turtle was ready to fight, it had sustained quite a bit of damage.

"You cheated," accused the boy.

"You switched," replied Ceres calmly, "Therefore, Tabitha got to attack twice. Once for your Ponyta, and the other time for your Grotle. It's now your turn."

She exchanged a glance with Tabitha, and the bird quickly slapped the turtle with his wings a few more times.

"Now I've cheated," Ceres stated simply.

The boy stared disbelievingly at his almost unconscious Grotle.

"Wing Attack," Ceres ordered again.

With one more beat of Tabitha's wings, the Grotle groaned, and sank to the ground, pulling its legs and head into its shell.

"Don't use Withdraw, use an attacking move! Grotle! Are you even listening to me?"

While the boy shouted at his unresponsive turtle Pokemon, Ceres recalled Tabitha, and began to walk away. Unfortunately for her, the boy looked away from his Pokemon just in time to notice this.

"Grotle, return, Ponyta, Ember!"

"Shelly, Bubblebeam," Ceres said without turning. Her Prinplup appeared well before the attack came anywhere near her, and when met with a stream of bubbles, the Ponyta's Ember vanished altogether. Shelly's attack went on to hit the Ponyta, which shielded its trainer, but was knocked out in doing so.

"Return," the boy said dejectedly. He looked up to see that Ceres and Shelly were already quite far away. "I'll stop you next time!"

Ceres hardly heard him, and she didn't stop to reply. Before long she had reached the next nearest town, Solaceon. She almost stopped there, but the townspeople, who were almost as irritating as those in Hearthome, convinced her to keep moving.

She stopped suddenly a few steps into the next route. For a moment, she was confused as to why she had done so. Then she realized that she didn't want to continue. She didn't want to get any closer to the city or town beyond the route.

It took her a few seconds to convince herself that she was being entirely illogical, and a few more seconds to continue on her way. By then, Shelly had noticed her trainer's unease.

Neither said a word however, continuing on even as it began to rain suddenly. They trudged on in silence, ignoring the icy drops of water beginning to pelt them.


	13. Chapter 12: Unnatural

Chapter 12: Unnatural

On what was once the route above Solaceon there sat a small cottage, with a sign outside that read 'Café Cabin'. It was small, but cozy, and most travelers used to stop by to wait out the inevitable rain of route 210.

One day, when the rain began to pour, a waitress happened to glance out the window and see a girl and her Pokemon walk by. They seemed oblivious to the pouring rain, and although the waitress guessed that the Pokemon didn't mind the downpour, as it seemed to be a water type, she couldn't imagine the girl being so oblivious to the storm.

She decided to run outside and invite them in, but as she turned around she knocked a glass off the counter, and ended up having to clean up the mess it left when it shattered.

By the time she'd cleaned up the glass, the girl and her Pokemon were long gone.

She almost forgotten about them when she heard the door open, and saw a girl walk in. At once, something seemed off about the girl. She shook her head suddenly, trying to dispel the strange feeling of unease that the girl gave her.

She faked a pleasant smile, and welcomed the girl to the restaurant. She asked the girl if she'd like anything, and for a while she received no reply.

The waitress was suddenly acutely aware that she was the only one working at the café that particular day. She remembered cursing her bad luck earlier when both of the other waitresses on duty that day called in sick; and remembered later being glad when no customers had showed up. Now she wished the place were busy, so that she wouldn't be alone with the strange girl, who still hadn't spoken, and was making her quite nervous.

The girl finally shook her head, but stayed there, watching the waitress closely. It was silent for a few more seconds, before the waitress pretended to be busy organizing nearby glasses. She tried to casually suggest that the girl sit down and wait out the storm, but her voice shook slightly as she proposed the idea.

The girl moved with strange grace to the nearest table, and sat down in the chair.

Out of the corner of her eyes, the waitress watched her as she arranged and rearranged the glasses.

At first, she had thought that the only strange thing about the girl was the state of her clothes, which were torn in places, and the deep, stitched-up scratches on her skin. She looked as though she'd taken a stroll through a forest of broken glass.

Then she realized that, although it was raining outside, the girl seemed completely dry. She didn't seem to have walked through the storm at all.

She waitress shuddered, but couldn't quite explain why. Perhaps the girl had brought an umbrella, and merely left it outside. Yes, that was probably what she'd done. Everything had to have a rational explanation.

She suddenly realized that the girl had spoken, and that she hadn't heard a word that she'd said.

"W-What?" she stammered, hating herself for how frightened she sounded. She was probably making the poor girl as nervous as the girl was making her, with her odd behavior.

"I was wondering if you'd seen a girl with a Prinplup," the girl asked so softly that the waitress nearly had to ask her to repeat herself a second time.

The waitress nodded slightly, and thought of the girl and the Pokemon that had passed by earlier.

"Excuse me, but have you seen them?" the girl asked before, and although she'd spoken a bit louder this time, the waitress found herself having a hard time understanding what had been said. It was as if she was speaking a foreign language, although she knew that wasn't true.

After a couple of moments, she understood the question, and a second later she finally managed to respond. "Y-yes…"

She gulped, and made herself continue, "They…went that way." She pointed vaguely east, and the strange girl stood up so suddenly that, if the waitress had blinked, she was sure she'd have missed it.

"I must be going," the girl said softly, heading for the door.

By the time the waitress understood what the girl had said, the door had slammed behind her, and she found herself calling a soft goodbye to a guest who had already left.

* * *

><p>It was still raining when the next city came into view.<p>

As they drew nearer, the first thing they noticed was the noise. Even from a distance, they could hear people shouting, car breaks screeching, and much more that added to the general tumult.

Despite the noise, they kept walking, and were soon at the city's gates.

Shelly stopped for a moment to look back at her trainer, who had fallen a bit behind her, and realized that Ceres was shivering. She dismissed it as simply being cold, as it was still raining a bit, and the rain was as icy as ever.

She watched Ceres for a moment, but her trainer still didn't move. She glanced over at the city, and then back at Ceres a few times, trying to tell her to continue, but the girl didn't seem to notice.

Just as she was beginning to worry that her trainer would never continue, Ceres took a short, hesitant step in the direction of the city.

"Stop!" someone shouted suddenly, and Ceres froze again, shivering worse than before. Shelly turned to glare at the one who had startled her trainer, and saw another one of the 'Galactic Grunts' they had seen in Eterna City.

"Who are you, and why have you come to Jubilife?" the Grunt asked, continuing to shout although he was standing rather near to the Prinplup and her trainer by now.

Ceres seemed to be struggling to decide what to say, or do. Finally, she muttered something along the lines of "Leave us alone," and continued on her way into the city.

The Grunt was startled that she had responded at all for a moment, then he got over his shock, and tossed a pokeball in the direction of the retreating trainer, shouting, "Glameow, stop them!"

Shelly, having heard the order, spun around immediately, getting ready to attack the cat-like creature with a Metal Claw. That is, until she heard her trainer's orders.

"Return," Ceres said, narrowing her eyes at the Glameow. She stopped shivering long enough to grab Soot's pokeball, and release the rock type.

Something was off however. Even after the Geodude had formed, the white glow hadn't faded from around her.

The Glameow had been close enough to attack Ceres herself, but was distracted by the still-glowing rock type. The cat-like Pokemon hissed, and leapt to attack its opponent, but as its paws touched the white glow surrounding Soot, it yowled and leapt away, landing in a rather clumsy tumble in an attempt to prevent its now-severly-burnt paws from being hurt further.

The Geodude began to grow, and change shape, her two arms become four. She grew legs suddenly, and as the glow faded, it was apparent that she was no longer a Geodude at all.

"Graveler!" she shouted triumphantly.

For a moment, the Galactic Grunt merely stared at Soot. Then, he muttered a quick, barely audible apology to Ceres, and ran off. His Glameow hissed at him as he ran, attempting to follow, but being unable to walk, let alone run to keep up with them.

It took the cat Pokemon a moment to notice that Ceres had drawn nearer to it. When it did notice, it hissed again, and attempted to slash at her with its claws, before discovering that they had been burned off.

Ceres inched closer to the Glameow, her arm parallel to her body.

The injured Glameow waited until the trainer drew close before twisting and biting at her arm.

Ceres hardly seemed to notice, and instead of backing off, she picked up the Glameow with her other arm, careful not to touch its injured paws, not wanting to damage them anymore.

She began to walk off, before seemingly realizing something.

"Return," she ordered suddenly. Soot looked around for a moment, trying to figure out whom her trainer was talking to, before realizing that she was the only Pokemon that Ceres had sent out. She gave the girl a doubtful look, and glanced for a moment at the Glameow before deciding that it was indeed no threat. She still looked a bit doubtful, even as she transformed into red light, and vanished into the black pouch that contained her pokeball.

Ceres started to walk off again, not entirely sure where she was going, but knowing that the building that she was looking for had to be somewhere in the city.

The Glameow, still unhappy at being carried away, continued to gnaw at Ceres' arm, to no avail. It batted weakly at her face with its claws, badly burnt paws. Eventually, all the effort exhausted it, and, despite itself, it fell asleep in Ceres' arms.

The girl faintly noticed that the cat Pokemon had stopped biting her, and glanced down at it to make sure that it hadn't died. When she saw that it was only sleeping, she continued her search.

She passed innumerable buildings, and was nearly run over by countless careless drivers. She had disliked the city the moment she'd set foot in it, but by now, she loathed it.

She was still cold, and there were muddy puddles everywhere from the rain. Every time a car narrowly missed her, she found herself having to shield the sleeping Glameow she still held from a splash of muddy water.

By the time she actually reached the building she had been looking for, she almost didn't notice it.

Its bright red roof was dull in comparison to the buildings around it. Its normally white-walls were muddy and covered in graffiti. No one seemed to notice the building, and she briefly wondered if it was abandoned.

Nonetheless, she walked over to the tarnished Pokemon Center, and softly pushed open the front door.

Immediately, she was met by a shriek, and someone within the building cried, "Go away! I already told you, Pokemon Center's have never charged money for their services, and they never will!"

Ceres frowned, and walked a bit further into the building, the heels of her boots clicking loudly against the tiled floor of the center. The sound echoed throughout the tiny, mostly empty building.

"Go away," the voice cried again as she drew closer.

She walked over to the counter, where a bunch of broken machinery lay scattered about. Among the battered mechanisms, she recognized a PC, used for storing Pokemon when a trainer had more than six, and one of the machines that usually healed trainers injured Pokemon. Both looked broken beyond repair.

"I said, go away!" the voice shrieked suddenly, sounding very close by. Ceres winced, and the Glameow in her arms woke with a start, yowling piteously as it tried to move its injured paws.

It bit Ceres again, startling her into nearly dropping it. It continued to struggle, and Ceres had a hard time keeping her hold on it.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw someone peeking out from behind a counter, watching her.

"Hold still," she muttered angrily to the Glameow. The panicked cat Pokemon didn't listen, and continued writhing, hissing, and biting her arms. It was obviously hurting itself further as it struggled.

She knew she had to figure out some way to stop the Pokemon, but she also knew that there was no way it was going to listen to her. She also knew that she had to hurry, and all of this combined finally got to her.

_"Stop it," _she hissed sharply.

The Glameow froze, and looked up at her slowly, seeming more frightened than ever.

_"You spoke," _it mewed, and she had understood it as she had understood Shelly, and all her other Pokemon. This time however, there was no denying it, and there was no ignoring it.

_"You spoke," _the Glameow repeated dazedly.


	14. Chapter 13: Extraordinary

Chapter 13: Extraordinary

Another Galactic Grunt had been posted to guard Veilstone by the time a Roselia wandered up to the gates, soaked with rainwater, and looking rather ill. He thought nothing of it, and let the grass type past, not really caring enough about wild Pokemon to stop them from entering the city.

"Probably wont last long in Veilstone anyway," he mumbled, sounding a bit bored.

The Roselia grew more and more uncomfortable the further into the city she went. Gone were the trees, and leaves, and familiar grass.

"Guardian, give me a sign," she whimpered, "Where am I to go? What am I to do next?"

She waited, but nothing happened. The same loud, colorful steel creatures kept rushing past her, roaring as they did so, and she was too tired to fight back. She was also feeling rather ill, and this reminded her of her rather unpleasant trek from the small town to this large city.

On the route before the city it had been raining, and like every grass type would, she simply absorbed the water. She had no idea that one route could stretch on for so long. After a while she began to feel seriously ill, and had to allow the rainwater to remain on her skin.

It was an unpleasant feeling, being surrounded by water. She had focused so entirely on getting off the route and out of the rain that she had temporarily paid no attention to the trees and grasses around her. It had been enough, she was sure; to miss whatever sign the guardian may have sent her.

Discouraged, she sat beside the black path through the city, on the uncomfortable gray substance that was the farthest thing from grass that she'd ever known.

"I've come all this way," she muttered, "and I'll never find her. Something bad will happen, and it will be all my fault."

Just as she was about to give up hope entirely, a short breeze drifted past her, carrying with it the scent of flowers, and trees, and forests. A single, tiny leaf was blown along as it floated past her, and through the city.

She got up a little too quickly, but hardly noticed in her haste to follow the barely-visible leaf.

"I wont give up Guardian," she promised.

"You spoke! I know you did, don't lie to me!"

Ceres was trying her best to ignore the cat Pokemon and act like it had never spoken, and she had never understood it. It didn't make sense. Humans couldn't understand Pokemon.

"Pay attention to me," the Glameow hissed, "You spoke! You spoke like a Pokemon. Like a Glameow!"

"I can assure you, I am not a Glameow," Ceres muttered, sure now that she was speaking her own language once more.

The cat Pokemon, encouraged by the acknowledgement, continued the line of conversation. "Of course you're not," it stated obviously, "You have some sort of weird accent. I can't recognize it."

"I think you're missing something quite obvious, and that is the fact that I am not a Pokemon," Ceres mumbled.

"Well plain old humans can't understand me, or any other Pokemon," the Glameow mewed indignantly, "I'm not stupid. You can't be a human." It narrowed its eyes. "What are you?"

"I don't have time for this," Ceres said quietly, "I brought you to what looked to be a Pokemon Center in hopes that they'd heal your paws, but it seems right now that your head is worse off."

The Glameow hissed at her. "You're a liar and you still understand me. Humans can't─"

"Um…excuse me," a voice called timidly from amidst the rubble of ruined machines.

Ceres and the Glameow were temporarily distracted from their argument, and both looked over to see a rather frightened looking Pokemon nurse standing behind the ruined center's counter.

"I could take a look at you Glameow if you want," she said hesitantly, "but with the shape the center is in, I'm not sure I'll be able to do much."

Ceres glanced down at the Glameow in her arms, and nodded. She supposed it was worth a try.

She made her way carefully through the wrecked machines and carefully placed the Glameow on the counter in front of the nurse. She looked away from the cat-like Pokemon, only to see that the nurse was paying more attention to her than to the Pokemon.

"You're…one of them," she said, backing away, "I knew it!"

Ceres stared at her blankly for a moment, before asking, "One of whom?"

"That symbol! You're with those 'Team Galactic' people, aren't you?" The nurse asked.

"That's ridiculous, she can't be─" the Glameow turned its head to look at Ceres, and finally seemed to notice the yellow 'G' on the front of her dress. "You aren't a Grunt," it said slowly, "and I've never seen you before." The cat-like Pokemon paused for a moment. "You must be an imposter," she concluded with a hiss.

"You're upsetting this Pokemon," the Pokemon nurse said, obviously struggling to keep her voice calm, "I'm going to have to ask you to leave. The stress of having someone like you around won't do Glameow any good."

For a fraction of a second Ceres appeared to be angry, but as soon as the faint trace emotion had appeared, it was gone. She glanced down at the Glameow once more.

"If it weren't for me, she'd still be lying out in the middle of some street, I am not─" Ceres realized suddenly that she was no longer speaking English, and fell silent. She stared at the nurse's shocked face for a moment before saying, "I am not about to simply leave this Glameow here. I will be outside."

She spun around and walked out of the building, stopping just outside the doors, and leaning against one of the graffiti-covered walls.

For a long while she wall still, listening to the sounds of the city and watching as people rushed about, always hurrying, noticing neither her, nor the tiny center beside her.

Suddenly, a slight breeze drifted past her, briefly carrying away the acrid stink of the city, and replacing it with a pleasant, almost floral scent. For some reason, she shivered.

"Miss me, 'Commander'?"

Ceres glanced around quickly, but saw no source of the voice. Of course not though, the one to whom the voice belonged was dead.

"It wasn't very nice, you know, killing me."

Ceres struggled to keep irrational fears from her mind. This wasn't possible. The Roselia was dead.

"I'm back now. I'll get rid of you once and for all, and─"

A sharp yowl interrupted whatever the voice had been about to say. Ceres broke suddenly out of her fears, and hurried into the Pokemon Center.

"I'm only trying to help you, Glameow," Ceres heard the nurse saying. Across the room, she could see the cat Pokemon struggling to get away on her burnt paws. "If you would just hold still and let me look at your paws─ ow!" The nurse pulled her hand back suddenly, wrenching it out of the grip of the Glameow's sharp teeth.

"Having trouble?" Ceres called. She could tell that the nurse was glaring at her, even from across the room.

"I'm fine!" she shouted back irritably, "although Glameow seems afraid of me. Maybe it's humans in general…did you do this to her?"

Ceres walked calmly over to the counter before replying. "It attacked my Geodude as it evolved into Graveler. Whatever injuries it may have, it has only itself, and its former trainer to blame."

"Former?" The Glameow asked with a hiss, "He'll find me, just you wait."

"He left you," Ceres stated harshly, "And I doubt you can fight with what you've done to your paws. Why would he want you back?"

The Glameow hissed at her, but she took no notice.

"Are you talking to this Glameow?" The nurse asked suddenly, startling both Ceres and the aforementioned Glameow, as they had entirely forgotten that she was there.

"Of course not," Ceres replied quickly, "I wouldn't know what it was saying, and it surely wouldn't understand me."

"We understand you just fine! It's you humans that have the problem, not understanding us," the Glameow replied.

"So you admit that I'm a human?" Ceres asked.

The Pokemon nurse looked entirely lost.

"I'm not talking to you," Ceres told her, and then she turned her attention back to Glameow.

"That's not what I meant," the cat-like Pokemon said quickly, "I mean you and all the others who at least speak human languages. Even if we can understand you, it's not easily. You all talk so slowly. It's like talking to a rock type. Ick."

"Talking to a rock type would certainly be more pleasant than talking with you," Ceres muttered.

"I'm not─"

"Even talking to this Pokemon nurse would be more pleasant than talking to you," Ceres said, glancing at the confused woman she had just interrupted.

"I give up," the nurse muttered.

Ceres and Glameow were about to resume their quarrel when the doors swung open, and a man and his Pokemon walked slowly in.

The Pokemon nurse became utterly still, immediately noticing the familiar emblem on the man's outfit. She glanced warily at the Pokemon beside him.

Slowly, he began to walk towards the counter once more. For a moment, his Pokemon was completely still. Then, so quickly that Ceres' eyes barely registered its movement, it hopped over to stand beside its trainer. They gradually grew closer. Finally, near the counter, they stopped, the man watching both of them intently, the Pokemon more focused on the Glameow than the other humans.

"W-What do you want?" the nurse stammered, "I've already given you people my answer."

The man seemed confused at this. "I've absolutely no idea what you're talking about," he said, "and frankly, you're wasting my time."

He turned to face Ceres, and she met his gaze blankly. "Why are you here?"

She glanced over at the Glameow on the counter, who was warily watching the unfamiliar man's Pokemon. "This Glameow burnt its paws," she stated, "unfortunately, the nurse here seems unable to help it in the least."

"If you people hadn't come in here and destroyed all my equipment and supplies─"

The man glared at the nurse, and she fell silent. "I've already told you that I don't know what you're talking about." He then focused on Ceres once more, and clarified his earlier question, "What are you doing here in Veilstone?"

Ceres was silent for a long while, thinking. "Master Cyrus said I'd know where to go."

The silence stretched on, and, except for a drawn out hiss from the Glameow, who still wasn't fond of the way the man's Pokemon was watching her, it remained unbroken.

Then the man asked Ceres a simple question, "What is your name?

"Ceres."

"It's true then…" he paused once more, and then said, "We're leaving. Follow me."

Ceres picked Glameow up off the counter, holding her well out of the reach of the man's Pokemon.

"You can't just take that Pokemon! Its paws are badly injured! You need to─"

The nurse's words were cut off as the door slammed behind them.

"Where are we going?" Ceres asked.

"Headquarters," the man replied, and he did not elaborate beyond that.

Ceres paused for a moment, before asking, "Why?"

"Because you missed where you were supposed to be by a couple of blocks," the man replied, "and you have no idea how much time we've been forced to waste looking for you." He turned to his Pokemon then, "Find the others, I don't want them wasting any more time looking for her."

The Pokemon nodded sharply and hopped away quickly, vanishing from sight entirely in a matter of seconds.

The man continued walking in the opposite direction, and Ceres followed immediately.

Noticing that the Glameow in her arms was oddly silent, Ceres glanced down at it to find it watching the man she was following with something resembling awe.

"You must be important," the Glameow admitted reluctantly, "if the Commanders are out looking for you."

Ceres noted the comment, but its importance paled in comparison to her curiosity about their destination.

They had been walking for quite a while when the man whom she was following suddenly stopped.

"Here we are," he said gesturing vaguely towards the building directly in front of them, "Team Galactic Headquarters."

Ceres was sure she'd never seen such an extraordinary building in her life, and yet, it seemed somehow familiar…


	15. Chapter 14: Conflict

Chapter 14: Conflict

The building was tall and conspicuous. It was largely square with a huge silver dome in the center adorned with a colossal golden G. It had several floors and the sides of the building were lined with spikes. Around the center of the building was a shining gold ring rotating slowly and glinting in the faint sunlight peeking out from behind the clouds above the city. In front of the building were two huge satellite dishes like nothing Ceres had ever seen. A nearby sign read 'Galactic Veilstone Building, We Dream of the Universe!'

"I'm going to inform Cyrus of your presence. Head inside. Don't wander off."

With that the man who had brought her to the building hurried inside. After a few seconds Ceres followed him slowly, still looking around at the building, trying to remember where she had seen it before. The building seemed a bit dreamlike somehow, and as she walked through the doors, she realized why.

The interior of the building reminded her of a certain building from her dreams, or rather her one recurring dream, although she was certain why. The walls seemed the same, and the rooms were full of strange machinery that she thought she may have seen in the hallways of her dream. The floor was all different however, brown with plain brown tiles rather than the thin gray tiles that she'd imagined. There were a few tables about, surrounded by small metal chairs. A few scientists wandered about the floor, occasionally watching her strangely. Out of the corner of her eye she saw a door slide shut, but when she turned to inspect it more closely she saw nothing but a continuing wall and a small keypad.

She cast the familiarity of the building from her mind, and sat down at a table, frowning at the silver crisscrossed pattern on its surface.

She had forgotten all about the Glameow she held until the Pokemon began to squirm about in an attempt to escape.

"Is something wrong?" she asked quietly, so as not to be heard by the scientists around the room.

_"Let me go! I know this place!" _The Glameow tumbled out of Ceres' arms and hit the floor with a dull thump, drawing the attention of a few people nearby.

"Go ahead," Ceres mumbled, laying her head on her arms, staring blankly at the wall. She heard some scrabbling and hissing as the injured cat Pokemon attempted to run across the floor, only to find it very difficult to walk on what little remained of its paws.

There was silence for a while before Ceres heard a door open behind her, and the Glameow's frantic scrabbling began again. _"Pick me up,"_ she hissed, _"quick!"_

Ceres sighed, spun around, and picked the panicked Pokemon up off the floor. "What a sudden change in attitude," she noted softly.

The Glameow hissed and attempted to sit up straight, watching the door attentively and hardly moving. Ceres followed its gaze slowly to see two very irritated-looking Pokemon stomp through the door, followed after a few seconds by two familiar trainers.

_"What a waste of time, out looking for her. What a bother," _hissed the first, a Purugly, _"and the frog and her human found her anyway. What an awful day. It will take years to get all this grime out of my fur…"_

The second, a Skuntank, said something in reply, but seemed to speak differently than the Purugly. Ceres could hardly understand a word that the skunk Pokemon was saying. It sounded as though the two were arguing however. Their trainers weren't speaking to each other at all. They seemed to be upset about something.

There was a sudden commotion as most of the scientists on the floor hurried from the room. Ceres frowned slightly, confused as to what exactly was going on.

The two trainers, whom Ceres recognized from the Valley Windworks and Eterna City respectively, were silent for a few seconds, although it seemed longer due to Ceres not having anything to focus on other than the hateful looks that the two commanders were giving each other.

After what seemed like forever, Mars dragged her glare away from Jupiter to glance momentarily at Ceres. A triumphant smirk replaced her scowl. "Told you Saturn found her," she said in a singsong sort of voice.

Jupiter said nothing, although her glare intensified. After a moment she apparently decided to change the subject, "It's a good thing we got the chance to find out. You never would have known you were right if we'd been hit by those seven or so cars you dragged me right out in front of!"

"If you'd actually been running I wouldn't have had to drag you along," Mars replied, sounding irritated, "and you say I'm lazy, Miss 'I don't feel like chasing Pokemon around right now'."

"I apologize if I was opposed to chasing a demented frog and an obese cat through grimy city streets˗"

Mars was obviously angry again, "For the last time, Purugly's got a little extra fur, that's all."

"Maybe if you'd stop feeding her so much, I swear, we could feed _all_ the grunts' Pokemon for a _month _with the food that that stupid cat eats in a day!" It was Jupiter's turn to look smug when Mars seemed at a loss for a comeback.

She glanced around the room again, and her eyes fell on the Skuntank still arguing with her Purugly in the strange same-but-differetn language that Ceres could understand so little of. "At least Purugly doesn't _kill anyone off _by just _walking through the room. _I swear, I can't even _breathe _when that skunk is around."

Despite all the insults being tossed their way the Pokemon were still caught up in their own little argument.

_"I don't know why we put up with you, or your trainer. You smell absolutely awful for one thing, your trainer is possibly one of the most boring people in this entire building, second only to Saturn, I mean, at least that old lavender-haired man is crazy enough to be entertaining˗" _The Purugly continued to chatter incessantly, most of its speech consisting of an endless stream of insults.

Ceres chose instead to focus on the Skuntank, and when the Pokemon finally managed to cut the cat Pokemon off and get a comment in edgewise, she could understand a few words here and there. After some effort she managed to piece together something along the lines of, _"At least I know when to shut up," _and _"my trainer is sane, unlike yours," _and _"like trainer, like Pokemon."_

Meanwhile the argument of the trainers in question had looped back around to the subject of very nearly being run over by several cars.

"I really hope that no one saw us headed towards this building," Jupiter was saying, "I don't really feel like explaining how I was dragged out into the middle of some of the busiest streets in Veilstone, or why _someone _couldn't wait for the cars to pass like a _normal _person instead of running out into the path of a large, fast-moving vehicle like an escaped mental patient."

"'Least if I ever got into trouble I'd be able to get myself out," Mars sang, and Jupiter's expression darkened, "Remember that time you were supposed to pick up that one artifact from that one museum? I didn't even know it was _possible _to alert security guards to your presence so quickly…and _I _had to bail you out of that one, remember?" It was obviously that she did, and it was not a very pleasant memory. "I caused a little bit of a mess, I admit, but Boss Cyrus was really angry at _you _in particular. Remember how you thanked me for helping you out? Never thought I'd hear˗"

"Yes Mars, for the umpteenth time, I do remember," Jupiter hissed, venom in her tone, "And I regret thanking you ever since, seeing as you've never _let _me forget the incident." Jupiter turned on her heel and stomped away, recalling Skuntank into its pokeball as she left, cutting short the argument between the skunk Pokemon and Mars' Purugly.

For a moment, Mars looked a bit shocked for a moment, as if she hadn't expected a biting reply from Jupiter. The look vanished as soon as it appeared however, to be replaced by a smirk. She practically danced over to sit beside Ceres.

"So Saturn found you," she said, her gaze darting from Ceres, to the Glameow she held, and back to Ceres again.

Ceres thought of the man who had found her in the tiny, dingy Pokemon Center. Her mind made a loose connection between the man and his name. She remembered, but not as much. The memory was unclear, as if there were fog obscuring what she knew about the man. Her mind flicked immediately through the few faces currently in her memory. Mars she could remember of course, as she was sitting right beside her, but suddenly she could hardly recall Jupiter. Her name and her face were still there, but the harder that she tried to find a way around the fog to remember how she knew how she was, and where she'd seen her before, her mind shut down partially, and she forgot what she was thinking about entirely.

"Ceres?" Mars gave her a questioning look, and Ceres vaguely recalled that she was waiting for an answer of some sort. She nodded vaguely, and it was difficult to see that she'd nodded at all. She wasn't paying much attention to the question at hand.

Her mind tried desperately to hold on to strands of her thoughts that had already slipped away. Having nothing to cling to, she reflected upon the most recent conversations she'd heard.

"You and Jupiter don't get along," she noted, mentally berating herself for stating something so obvious and probably trivial.

An expression of a complicated emotion crossed Mars' face. It was there and gone in a flash, and Ceres couldn't identify it in time. She had a feeling that even if the name for the emotion came to mind, she wouldn't be quite sure what it meant. She supposed that she should have been feeling something then at her loss for names and faces and places, something that she thought she would have called 'frustration', and yet she felt nothing. In fact, she˗

"It's that noticeable, huh?" Mars asked, breaking into her thoughts.

Ceres' mind raced to analyze the underlying meaning in the question. 'Rhetorical'? Or was it slightly 'sarcastic'? She pushed the thoughts from her mind and mumbled something without thinking. It sounded like, "I suppose you could say that," and then she asked, "Why is that? That you fight like you do, that is," although she was almost entirely certain that she didn't care. _Almost_ entirely because she was once more at a loss to define 'caring' as she was almost sure she had been at some point in the past.

"Oh, you know," Mars said, in a tone which Ceres would have described as 'offhanded', although she did not quite understand the term. "A few harsh words here, and disagreement there, she hates me, and a few differences in opinion among other things."

"Your Pokemon don't get along either," Ceres said, 'matter-of-factly' actually, although she had not intended it.

Mars gave her an odd look. 'Confusion' Ceres identified, 'Surprise', 'Doubt', and maybe faint 'Interest' of some sort. It was such a jumbled, confusing look that Ceres could not help questioning it, asking, "Is something wrong?" in a tone which, to her, sounded to be without the mysterious 'caring'.

"You still understand them then?" Mars asked, and Ceres was too befuddled to try to work out all the feelings behind this question.

"When I listen," Ceres replied softly, "when I admit that I can hear them, what they're saying, that is. Mostly is started with this." She held up the Glameow that had been sitting on her lap, and the Pokemon remained obediently still.

"What happened to her paws?" Mars asked, her tone full of something that Ceres identified without even trying. 'Horror', she thought, with a tiny bit of something that she might have called 'Pride'.

"She jumped on Soot while it was evolving," Ceres explained dully, "My Graveler that is," she added, remembering that there was no chance of Mars knowing the nickname she had given to her Pokemon.

"Aw, poor kitty," Mars cooed, reaching for the Glameow. Ceres handed the cat Pokemon over unthinkingly, as if it were an object rather than a Pokemon. Out of the corner of her eye she noticed a movement from a little ways across the room. She glanced over to see Mars' Purugly glaring at the Glameow she now held, flattening its ears to its head and fluffing up its fur it a way that made it look almost twice its size. A loud, drawn-out hiss from the cat Pokemon did not escape Mars' notice however, and she quickly handed the injured Glameow back to Ceres.

She stood up quickly and skipped over to stand beside her Purugly. "You know you'll always be Mommy's favorite," she said with a tinkling laugh. 'Mommy's favorite' shot her a glare, but its fur began to lie flat.

The Glameow on the other hand was mortified. _"I've upset Purugly…Arceus in the heavens, I've upset Purugly…my life is over…" _She let out a mewing sob, _"I'm dead, I'm dead…"_

'Exaggerating' Ceres told herself. She paid the little cat Pokemon no mind, focused instead on the interaction between Mars and her Purugly. Yet another thing that she couldn't understand, it seemed. She sighed deeply, although she wasn't quite sure why, and the sigh drew Mars' attention away from her cat.

"That reminds me Ceres," Mars said, "You'll probably be staying her a while, and I bet you forgot how to get around here˗" she stopped suddenly, realizing that she'd made a mistake, and backtracked a bit, "I mean…everybody gets lost the first time they arrive. All those warp panels are pretty confusing. Even I get lost sometimes. Well…let me show you around." She began to walk away, and her Purugly hissed discontentedly. "And I called Jupiter lazy," Mars said, frowning at the cat, "We're just going to take a walk around the building˗" Another irritated hiss from the cat Pokemon made her recall it before turning to Ceres again, and motioning for her to follow.

Ceres hopped to her feet, still holding the panicking Glameow, and walked towards Mars. As soon as the other commander was sure that she was following, she wandered over to the wall with the keypad and typed in a code, which Ceres mentally repeated to herself so as not to forget.

"587516," Mars whispered to her, and she nodded. She watched as Mars turned back to the keypad and pressed the red 'x' button under the numbers.

With a whooshing sound, the wall slid back and to the side, revealing a doorway that had not been there previously. "You have to press the 'x'," Mars said quietly, "the 'enter' button sets off an alarm. Tricky, huh?" She then walked through the doorway, and headed up a flight of stairs.

Ceres nodded slowly and absently, and numbly followed Mars. As soon as she passed through the doorway it slammed shut behind her.

"I forgot to mention," Mars called back to her, "The door's timed. Don't get caught in it. We've lost a lot of grunts that way."

Ceres blinked, repeated the warning to herself a few times, and began to follow Mars again. She almost paused once. Behind her was everything she knew. She knew not what to expect from anything onward. For a moment she began to doubt where she was headed, but she soon realized that the thought was inconsequential and pointless, and she put it from her mind. She did not stop. She did not turn back.

* * *

><p>She leaned against one of the human's filthy buildings, staring forlornly at the larger, stranger building ahead. She was still determined to reach the girl however, and dispose of her. The guardian willed it to be so. So she would wait.<p>

She stayed still, watching the strange building, watching as each unimportant human entered or left. Not one of the creatures was the one she was looking for, so she waited, thinking of her sign of hope from the guardian, trying to put the ugly sounds of the human city from her mind.


	16. Chapter 15: Passage

Chapter 15: Passage

Before following Mars up the stairs Ceres had resigned herself to leaving everything she'd known behind. Upon reaching the top of the staircase however, she found herself faced with an all-too-familiar hallway. The familiarity merely seemed a bit strange to her now, although some time ago she may have felt some along the lines of 'fear'. The hallways reminded her of 'fear', and yet she felt none.

"Through this hallway and into the room with the television," Mars mumbled, "and then through the warp panel-"

She continued to mutter to herself, apparently trying to remember exactly how to navigate the building, but Ceres heard nothing beyond 'warp panel'. She didn't know why, but she didn't want to go anywhere near any such panel. It was entirely illogical to want to stay as far away from the things that would bring her to the end of her mission as possible, but the mere mention of the panels reminded her once more of 'fear', and she recalled once more that it hadn't been a pleasant feeling, back when she'd felt such trivial things.

She wasn't really sure that she did remember though. Did she have any memories of 'fear'? Did she have any real memories at all? What were memories? Perhaps it was reviving the past somehow or something along the lines of that, but what was the past? Did it truly matter if it no longer really existed? Did it exist, no longer being lived?

"Ceres?" Mars called from somewhere further ahead.

Ceres shook her head, wondering why she'd been considering such utterly unimportant things as the past and faint memories of fainter and even less significant things like feelings. She refused to think about such a thing as 'fear' and began to walk again, for at some point in her pointless thinking she'd come to a total stop. Her pace was the same as always, so it took her some time to catch up to Mars, who was waiting semi-patiently beside the entrance to a large room.

"What kept you?" Mars asked when she finally covered the distance between them.

Ceres did not respond. She merely stared at Mars in silence for a few seconds before the other commander looked away uncomfortably and led her to a glowing, yellow, circular panel in the corner of the room.

Mars stepped effortlessly onto the strange, glowing panel, and almost instantly vanished.

Ceres, on the other hand, could not seem to overcome a strange reluctance holding her back from following Mars. There was nothing threatening about the panel really, other than the fact that it was strange and that she could not conjure up a real memory of ever having encountered one before. In fact, it wasn't even that strange, for at least it felt familiar, even if she could not truly remember it. Something was holding her back, however, and although she knew it was important that she follow Mars and complete her mission, she could not bring herself to step onto the panel.

"_I've already upset Purugly," _hissed the Glameow in her arms suddenly, _"don't you go upsetting Mars. She's altogether scary when she's mad. Just step on the stupid panel. It's not going to hurt you, but Mars might if you keep her waiting."_

This seemed doubtful to Ceres. She had seen absolutely nothing to suggest that Mars was frightening in the least, but she stepped onto the panel anyway, the Glameow's words having snapped her out of her irrational doubts.

The wall she'd been staring at as she stepped onto the panel was instantaneously replaced with a poorly lit hallway colored various shades of grey and red. Here the familiarity faded. She didn't recognize this room much, if at all. She did still recognize Mars, who was standing at the apparent end of the hallway, leaning against a wall and watching Ceres with a fair amount of impatience. She began to walk towards Mars, forcing herself to keep her pace, although part of her wanted to sprint away from the strange panel that had carried her to the relatively unfamiliar room.

After she'd been walking for less than a second, Mars hurried over from the end of the hallway to walk beside her, which seemed strange to Ceres. Why would she walk back and undo the progress she'd already made? Although it wasn't really important that she knew the reason for Mars' strange behavior, she asked her anyway, "Why did you walk back in my direction after reaching the end of the hallway?"

"You're so slow," Mars complained, "I couldn't stand to wait over there any longer!"

"This is my normal walking pace," Ceres replied evenly, staring straight ahead at her destination rather than looking at the person to whom she was speaking.

"You always were slow," Mars said, "Can't you just speed up a little? That would help get us to where we're going faster."

Ceres merely shook her head, offering no explanation, although Mars seemed to expect one. Soon the hallway ended and they turned abruptly into a large, mostly empty room. It looked like a place where many might assemble, but there were only the two of them, three if one counted the Glameow, and they were already assembled, so Ceres saw little point in dwelling in the empty room for long.

After they'd crossed the room and walked through a short, rather pointless hallway they were met with another warp panel.

"You go first," Mars insisted.

"Why?" Ceres asked blankly.

"I want to make sure you actually keep moving! Boss Cyrus won't be any happier about all this waiting than I am, so we'd better keep going. Go on," she pushed Ceres towards the panel, and Ceres failed to catch her balance and fell against the wall beside the panel. A moment later she was in an entirely different room, falling to the floor, her heart racing in response to an emotion that she couldn't feel.

"Fear," she muttered as she fell.

The Glameow leapt out of her arms just before she hit the ground and tumbled across the tumbled floor until she hit a wall with a muffled thump. Ceres did not think to catch herself, and ended up landing painfully on her shoulder.

Mars appeared in the room a moment later to find an unhappy Glameow crawling away from the wall and mewing plaintively and a silent Ceres still lying on the ground where she'd fallen.

"Sorry," Mars told her, "but I wasn't sure you'd get on that panel on your own, and…are you going to get up?"

Ceres nodded and began to sit up; trying to push herself off the floor using the arm she'd fallen on. One she'd managed to sit up, she gave the arm a puzzled glance, feeling pain in her shoulder where she'd landed, but not knowing how to react to it. She picked up the complaining Glameow with her good arm and a moment later she got to her feet. She then stared at Mars as if to tell her to continue leading her through the building.

Mars gave her a strange look, but began to walk towards a staircase, muttering, "Past the nap room, up the stairs, down the hall, last panel."

The hall in question was rather long, and a silence settled over them as they walked. Nothing could be heard but the sound of their footsteps on the tiled floor. This hall had better lighting than the one connected to the meeting place. In addition to the fluorescent lights covering the ceiling overhead, several small windows dotted the wall on their right side at about eye level. Ceres noted multiple clouds covering the sky outside, but put them out of mind, as they too were unimportant.

At Ceres's relatively slow pace it took them a while to reach the warp panel they needed to use to reach their destination. They maintained their silence throughout the walk there.

"We have to take the last panel," Mars told Ceres, pointing past two glowing panels to a third.

Ceres nodded and forced herself to keep walking and step onto the panel when the time came to do so. She immediately appeared in a tiny room containing nothing but a staircase leading up into darkness. She took a few small steps off of the panel, and then she froze up again.

Mars appeared beside her a moment later.

"Here we are," she announced, gesturing to the tiny room around them, "well…almost. We go up those stairs and then we're there. Are you ready to explain to Boss Cyrus why we're late? 'Cause I'm not taking the blame for you and your warp panel phobia."

Ceres nodded faintly, not really listening to Mars, focused instead on the staircase ahead and the room that lay beyond.

"_Uh-oh," _said the Glameow, _"I've heard of this place, but I've never been here. This is the way to The Boss's room. This is really the staircase to really that room! Oh no…I didn't think we were really coming here. I can't do this! You can't make me go up there!"_ She began to squirm in Ceres's arms, but Ceres merely held on to her tightly, not paying much attention to the Glameow at all.

Instead she was thinking about the room ahead; the room beyond the staircase. This room was reminding her of a memory of an emotion, quite familiar by now. Now, more than ever, she was remembering fear. She didn't want to go up those stairs any more than the Glameow that she held did.

"Hello? Ceres? Are you ready?" Mars asked her again.

Taking a deep breath, Ceres forced herself to nod.

"Okay, let's go," Mars said, and began to scale the stairs with Ceres close behind.


	17. Chapter 16: Departure

Chapter 16: Departure

The staircase leading to their destination was long and dimly lit, giving them a lot of time to think about where they were going, and giving the Glameow that Ceres held a lot of time to be nervous and recall the innumerable horror stories she'd heard about the room ahead. All the while Mars grumbled about being late, obviously unhappy at being held up for so long due to Ceres's seemingly unwarranted hesitations. Even Ceres felt that if she could be in some sort of bad mood at any given moment, she'd be none too happy now.

So it was amidst a lot of various upset that the three made their way onwards, scaling the stairs step by step until the dim, ascending hallway ended and a slightly brighter room waited directly before them. Mars hurried into the room, and Ceres followed with a certain degree of reluctance.

The room was relatively with navy blue walls, each containing many tiny lights, like stars, which did an adequate job of illuminating the room. When the two commanders arrived, there were already four people assembled around the gray table in the center of the room. All eyes were on them as they took their places at the table next to the others, both sensing that they were unacceptably late.

"Commander Mars," Cyrus said, and Mars flinched. "I'm sure we're all very glad that you and Commander Ceres could join us. Unfortunately, you've kept us all waiting for quite some time. We thought we'd have to begin the meeting without you. Would you care to explain the cause of your delay?"

Mars glared at Ceres, but shuddered and looked away quickly when her sharp look was met with a strangely blank stare. "Ceres- ugh…never mind," she mumbled, shaking her head. Not daring to look up at Cyrus, she added, "I- no excuses. I sincerely apologize for the delay."

For a moment Cyrus gave Mars an unrelentingly harsh glare, and then he nodded and told her, "It is of little importance at the moment. For now, we must proceed to our meeting. Commander Charon, I believe you had something you wished to tell all of us?"

Ceres recognized the man who stood then to address them. She'd seen him before at the Valley Windworks. She distinctly remembered that Charon and Mars did not get along. She felt inclined to share Mars's sentiments about the man, despite the fact that she was unable to.

Charon began to speak, and she found herself only half listening. He was saying something about research notes. Perhaps he was talking of the ones she'd stolen from Professor Rowan some time ago. He spoke of the energy of evolution, and the Glameow in her arms shuddered. She recalled Soot's evolution, and how her Pokemon had changed from a tiny Geodude to a much larger Graveler. By the time she thought to focus on Charon again, she had already missed much of his speech.

"That having been said, with this new machine our scientists have been building, we may be able to harness the power of evolution," Charon said, "we're not entirely sure of how much the machine is capable of, but we are fairly certain that it is able to harvest and store the energy of a Pokemon which would normally evolve after being traded."

He went into a short explanation of how the machine worked, which Ceres heard little of, and understood none of, and then seemed to address her directly as he finished speaking.

"Of course," he said, "our machine does need a test subject, and as far as I am aware, very few members of Team Galactic have in their possession and Pokemon which evolves using the method currently required to harvest its energy." He looked away from Ceres as he continued to speak. "The machine requires a Pokemon such as Kadabra, Machoke," he told them, and then looked at Ceres once more before saying, "Graveler."

Ceres stared blankly at him, and without looking away, rummaged through the bag containing her Pokemon and placed a pokeball on the table in front of her. She looked at Cyrus for confirmation, and when she received no obvious reply, she simply rolled the pokeball across the table to Charon and focused her attention elsewhere.

"Perfect," Charon said with false enthusiasm, "Follow me, if you will."

He began to walk away, but the others remained around the table. It took him a moment to notice that he was walking alone, and then he stopped and looked back to see Cyrus and the majority of the other Commanders glaring at him.

"Of course," he said then, "We all know the way, and therefore Cyrus shall take the lead." He shuffled back with some reluctance to allow Cyrus to pass, and Mars followed closely behind, practically pushing Charon aside. Jupiter and Saturn followed Mars, and Charon was left at the back of the line with Ceres. He mumbled a few words angrily that Ceres didn't care to hear, and they all began to walk towards wherever it was the machine was being kept.

Ceres, unlike everyone else, had absolutely no idea where they were going, so she followed closely behind Charon. By the time they appeared to be nearing their destination, Ceres had lost count of the staircases and warp panels they had taken to get there.

Their destination appeared to be an underground lab of sorts. All around, strange containers full of an unidentifiable green substance glowed and bubbled as they walked.

Suddenly Cyrus stopped, and the other commanders followed suit. He turned to face Charon. "The machine?" he prompted.

"Ah, yes," Charon replied, and he took the lead briefly to direct them to a large, strange machine with more glowing buttons than Ceres felt like counting, and several screens full of complicated words that she had difficulty comprehending. She reluctantly tore her attention from the odd mechanism and focused on what the short, balding scientist known as Commander Charon was saying.

He was explaining the machine again, with more confusing words that she'd never bothered to learn, or at least couldn't remember, so instead of focusing much on what he was saying, she took note of Cyrus's reactions, as he seemed to understand all of what was going on.

Charon seemed to notice that much of his explanation was lost on the majority of his fellow Commanders, and stopped talking quite suddenly before mumbling, "Perhaps a demonstration would be better after all, hmm?"

He placed the pokeball containing Soot on a small, glowing panel on the top of the machine and pressed a few glowing buttons before confirming something using one of the many screens on the mechanism. The machine buzzed in a way that reminded Ceres of angry Combee, although where she'd ever come across such creatures was beyond her. Then Soot's pokeball vanished, and the machine whirred loudly, startling most of the people in attendance. A few seconds later, the pokeball reappeared on the opposite side of the machine.

"As I explained previously," Charon began again, "the machine is a modified version of something similar to the machines used to trade Pokemon between trainers. As such, it transfers the pokeball containing the subject Pokemon from this panel here to that one there, converting the pokemon inside to pure energy as it does so. However, instead of the Pokemon reforming on the other side, as would happen normally during the trading process, the machine stores the energy of the Pokemon. As you know, Pokemon like Graveler evolve after being traded, and would usually have done so at this point, before being transferred back into the pokeball. The machine captures the energy of the Pokemon's evolution, and the energy that is the Pokemon itself, and harnesses and stores it. We are left with greater energy in the machine with which to begin to craft the device we have been developing, and an empty pokeball. A small price to pay for the energy necessary to fulfill our dreams, don't you agree?"

Ceres had not really heard most of Charon's explanation, but she understood that Soot was gone. She understood that any other trainer would have been upset that their Pokemon had been taken from them so suddenly, never to return, but she didn't care. She felt nothing for her lost Pokemon, and so she nodded, and saw the others doing the same, some with much less certainty than she.

"The power of evolution is great," Charon continued, "as the good professor's notes stated them to be. If we gather no more than, say, fifty more Pokemon that evolve under similar conditions, we should have all the energy necessary to power our device."

"Commander Saturn," Cyrus said after Charon had finally finished speaking, "assemble the Grunts under your command and assign them to the task immediately. We have waited long enough to see our dream fulfilled."

Saturn nodded quickly and hurried off to do as Cyrus had said.

"Commanders Jupiter and Mars," Cyrus commanded, "prepare the rest of the grunts to travel to the lakes so that they will be ready to depart as soon as possible."

What little doubt Ceres had seen in the eyes of the Commanders vanished as they nodded determinedly and set off to complete the tasks assigned to them.

"Commander Ceres," Cyrus said finally, and she turned quickly to face him.

He handed her a small disc reading 'TM02-Fly'.

"Fill the empty spots on your team and focus on training your Pokemon to be as powerful as possible. You are not to travel to the lakes with the others when the time comes for their mission to commence, do you understand?"

Ceres nodded once, and then turned on her heel and marched out of the room, adhering as closely as she possibly could to the path she'd taken getting to the lab in hopes of quickly finding her way out of the building and getting on with her task. To her surprise, she found she knew the building better than she'd thought she had, and she had no little trouble finding her way back to the lobby.

She stopped suddenly at the doors leading out of the building, suddenly noticing an uneasy feel to her surroundings, and hurriedly released Marrow and Tabitha from their pokeballs, dropping the Glameow she'd been holding, and nearly the disc containing TM02 as well, in the process.

The Glameow hissed, but she paid it no mind. She ensured that both Tabitha and Marrow knew the move fly, and then, more at ease, stepped out of the building onto the path leading into Veilstone.


	18. Chapter 17: Frustration

Chapter 17: Frustration

After leaving the building, Ceres wasted absolutely no time in telling Marrow to fly her away. Marrow wasted no time in following orders. Tabitha followed closely behind, reluctantly carrying a still-complaining Glameow who seemed more than a little freaked out over Soot's sudden departure from the team. Just as the Staravia took off, he noticed something strange in the distance, but quickly put it out of his mind as they got further and further away from Veilstone.

_"Did you see that?" _the Glameow questioned frantically, _"You saw that, right? That was your Pokemon! It's gone now, just like that! It doesn't even exist anymore! It's energy now, not even a Pokemon anymore!"_

Ceres did her best to ignore the Glameow and pretend that it wasn't speaking. As far as she knew, Pokemon weren't supposed to speak, and yet she heard very clearly what the Glameow and Mars' Purugly had been saying. She'd never heard her other Pokemon say a thing.

"Why is it that can I understand what you're saying?" She asked the Glameow.

_"What? How can you even ask something like that at a time like this! A Pokemon just…just might as well have died! It's probably stuck in that machine forever now! How can that not bother you?"_

"I did not know that Graveler well," Ceres replied, "reflecting on its loss would be pointless and a waste of time. It would be useless sentimentality. Now will you answer my question?"

The Glameow fell silent instead of acknowledging that Ceres had asked something of it. Ceres in turn shifted her attention to more important matter, such as the fact that she had no idea where her Pokemon were going. In fact, she had absolutely no idea where they were, and he had a feeling her Pokemon knew just as little as she did about their location.

Everything around them was obscured by fog. Ceres looked down and realized she couldn't see the ground, so she supposed that they were at least high enough in the air so as not to crash land any time soon.

"Do you have any ideas as to where we are?" She asked Marrow, hoping perhaps that the Pokemon would speak as the Glameow had.

"Golbat," Marrow replied promptly.

Ceres sighed and glanced around at the fog once more. "I didn't think so," she replied.

They flew for a long while in relative silence before the fog began to clear.

"Land as soon as is possible," Ceres told Marrow, and the Golbat began to lose altitude rather quickly. Ceres simply let go of the Golbat when they got near enough to the ground that she could drop without injuring herself. Marrow hovered nearby while Tabitha attempted a landing.

Thrown off by the added weight of the Glameow on his back, Tabitha didn't land very smoothly, and by the sound of things, had probably injured one or more of his limbs.

Ceres recalled him wordlessly into his pokeball. It was nothing a Pokemon center couldn't fix.

She then looked around at the place where they'd landed. They were on the edge of a small town, and the fog had cleared almost entirely. The first thing she spotted was the Pokemon Center, quite visible thanks to its red roof. She made a mental note to visit the place for Tabitha's sake, for an injured Pokemon was of no use to her. The rest of the town appeared to be occupied by small houses of no particular interest and, after retrieving the Glameow that Tabitha had been carrying, Ceres decided to visit the Pokemon center before leaving.

"Marrow, return," Ceres told the Golbat as she walked. Marrow did as she was told, and Ceres was left alone with the silent Glameow.

Neither of them said a word until they reached the Pokemon center, at which point the Glameow muttered, _"Why bother? You don't care about a single one of your Pokemon."_

Ceres hesitated a bit before reaching the door. "I have been ordered to train my Pokemon. They're no good to me, nor Team Galactic if-" She stopped suddenly, because something was bothering her. "I…don't care…about a single one…" she echoed, sounding dazed.

"_We established that," _mumbled the Glameow, _"Are you going to actually enter the Pokemon center or just stand here staring at it like an idiot?"_

Ceres didn't reply. In fact, she seemed not to hear the Glameow at all. She didn't seem to see the Pokemon center in front of her. The entirety of the world seemed lost on her at that moment. "Don't care," she droned, "don't care…"

Then all at once she felt something. The emotion was notable due to its very presence where others were absent. It was simple frustration. It was faint of course, but irritating nonetheless and Ceres hurried to enter the Pokemon center in an attempt to escape it.

"Welcome to the Celestic Town Pokemon center," a cheery Nurse Joy greeted as Ceres approached the counter. "Would you like me to heal your Pokemon?"

Ceres nodded quickly, and handed her Pokemon over to Nurse Joy.

"What about that one?" The nurse asked of the Glameow in her arms.

Ceres simply shook her head, still appearing distracted.

"Well…alright," the Nurse Joy replied, sounding somewhat doubtful, "They'll be back to perfect health in no time."

Ceres nodded once more, and went to sit at the lone table in the center and wait for her Pokemon to be healed. She set Glameow down on the chair beside her and went back to her thoughts. She didn't care about her Pokemon. She hadn't felt anything when she'd realized that Soot was gone. She didn't care at all; yet something kept bothering her.

Something lurked just beyond the edges of her memory. An emotion danced just a step past what she was allowed to feel. Frustration threatened to overwhelm her as she thought about all this, and she resolved to put it from her mind.

"I've restored your Pokemon to full health," the nurse informed her helpfully, and she got up from where she was sitting, retrieved her Pokemon, and picked up Glameow on the way out of the Pokemon center, all wordlessly.

She walked out of the center and began to run. The reason why she was running was entirely illogical. She knew she couldn't outrun the one troublesome emotion that had somehow found its way to her when all others failed, but that didn't stop her from trying. She ran past little house after little house like her life depended on it, as if she were running from some sort of monster or at least some tangible being rather than something that clung to her heart and mind, refusing to let go and let her be.

A few citizens of Celestic Town gave her odd looks as she passed by, but she paid them no mind. She did not stop running until she reached the opposite end of Celestic Town, at which point she was too tired to continue fleeing. She simply let the frustration settle over her mind like a cloth over a birdcage, trapping all her thoughts beneath it and not letting a single one be seen or heard of without some underlying irritation at her inability to remember or to understand, present.

After catching her breath, she resolved to train her Pokemon as were her orders, although at the moment, nothing seemed less appealing to her. She wanted nothing more than to forget about her Pokemon, never having to see them again and never having to consider caring or uncaring.

"Marrow, Shelly, Tabitha, Toxious, Eye," Ceres mumbled, halfheartedly releasing the Pokemon from their pokeballs one by one. "Marrow, Shelly Tabitha, train on your own, Toxious, Eye, with me."

Her Golbat and Stravia set off immediately, with her Prinplup close behind. Her Stunky and her Drifloon waited nearby for her to give some sort of orders.

It was then that she realized that her team consisted of only five Pokemon now that Soot was gone. That wouldn't do, not at all. She was certain she could handle training a full team of six, and in fact, she was going to insist on it.

"Be on the lookout for a new teammate," the told Eye and Toxious, "Something to cover our weaknesses."

"Floooon," hummed Eye. Ceres took this to be an acknowledgement of what she had said, and began to walk away from Celestic Town and towards the tall grass just beyond its limits.

Halfway there Ceres stopped suddenly, mumbled, "don't care," and continued on her way.

* * *

><p>"I let her slip away again," the Roselia hissed, "She was so close, and now again she's gone." She was running as quickly as a Roselia-turned-human could, as was just reaching the outer limits of Veilstone. "You're running out of time," she reminded herself, "Out of time…"<p>

The ideal opportunity for taking the Commander out had never presented itself. She had exited the building accompanied by two flying types, and one of them had been part poison type. There was absolutely no way she could have taken down even one of the Pokemon, let alone both of them at the same time. She had no idea what she was going to do. It was then that she heard a conversation of interest to her.

"Agent Looker, are you sure Team Galactic would be in a place like this?"

She turned suddenly to see a boy with messy blond hair talking to a strange, dark-haired man in a brown coat.

"I am almost certain of this," the man replied, "in fact I am altogether certain. Yes! I am certain that the Team Galactic is here. I am certain that they are planning for something of great importance. And I am certain that we will be here to stop them when they put those plans into action!"

Glancing around to ensure that no one saw her, the Roselia returned to her true form, and wandered over to the two, twirling beside the messy-haired boy to get his attention.

"Hey look! A Roselia!" he exclaimed as if she were the most interesting creature on the face of the earth.

"Have I not told you already to focus?" the man called Agent Looker asked, sounding exasperated.

"Only about a million times, but I've never seen a Roselia here before! What do you think it's doing in Veilstone? I wonder what moves it knows. I wonder if it wants to join us! It could help us stop Team Galactic!"

"Roselia!" the Roselia cheered enthusiastically.

"That is ridiculous," Agent Looker replied, "A mere Roselia could not take down the Team Galactic!"

The Roselia glared at him, and with a twirl and a swirl of petals, she aimed a Petal Dance attack at the uncooperative man. It was a direct hit of course; her attacks rarely missed, but the man shook it off as if it were nothing and got back to his feet, dusting himself off and mumbling, "Well yes, perhaps it could help us take down the Team Galactic…"

"Roselia," she said with a nod.

Agent Looker and the boy returned to planning.


End file.
